Just a Plaything
by Smudge93
Summary: Alastair wants to play a game with the boys with Dean as the prize. Can the boys win or will Alastair break them completely?
1. Chapter 1

**Author's Chapter Notes:**

Dean gets a visitor and Sam and Ruby are pulled into a game to save him, but can they do it and what will be left to save at the end of it all?

This is a strange little story – you have been warned!!

Devils Inside

Dean toweled his hair and looked at his face in the mirror hardly recognising the man that was staring back at him, the face before him drawn and pale, the life and the light in his eyes waxing and waning before him. He sighed and closed his eyes, he could feel the ache inside him and he just wanted at this moment to close his eyes and sleep forever.

"Hell getting to sleep for even an hour would be nice."

He turned away from his reflection and walked out of the bathroom, dropping the towel as he went. He stopped dead and felt his heart freeze in his chest at the sight of the person before him.

"Hello Dean."

The smile on the face was warm but the eyes were deathly cold. "I was really disappointed that we never got to finish our little game."

He felt the hands grab his arms and he wanted to scream but his throat refused to give voice to his need. "I've got a new one though that I know that you'll love and guess what? Your brother can get to play in this one too, although he'll have to do better than the last time if he's gonna save you."

Dean could only watch as the hand that gripped his left arm moved to his chest and he felt the burning sensation tear through him. He would have dropped to his knees if the grip on his right arm hadn't been so tight. He felt it as they forced their way into his throat, killing the small cry that had gathered there before it could escape and he felt his inside turn to a liquid fire. The hands released him and he sank to his knees as the voices filled his head and he felt them invade every part of his being, slowly taking the pain that he already felt inside and feeding it until it was all he was. He curled up on the floor and tried to ride the wave of absolute terror that filled him as he realised what had just been done to him.

The demon smiled as he watched the man writhe on the floor at his feet, he opened a bottle of beer that had been sitting on the table in the room and sat down to wait for Sam. -

---

Sam had left his brother in the room and gone to do the laundry, needing a mundane task to keep his mind off the pain and the hurt that he was feeling for his brother after Dean's confession of guilt. Dean had told Sam what had happened in Hell, what he had did and it was tearing Sam apart to watch Dean struggle to carry that burden and not be able to do anything about it. Sam knew that he needed to find some way to ease his brother's pain before it broke him, but just like when Dean had made the deal, Sam had no idea what to do to save his brother. It was eating him alive inside.

He'd looked up from his thoughts and was walking towards the motel room door when he felt it. He wasn't quite sure what 'it' was but he had felt this way a couple of times now and they had both signaled the presence of the one demon that he hadn't managed to put down yet.

If that particular demon was here then his brother was in trouble.

He saw the clink of light that escaped from the opened motel room door and Sam stopped at the car, put the bag of fresh laundry in, and took Ruby's knife from the trunk. It probably wasn't going to kill Alastair, Sam knew that it was him, but at least it might buy them some time.

He cautiously approached the door and frowned as he pushed it open.

Alastair was sitting at the table in the room, sipping from the beer bottle in his hand and Dean was on the floor, curled in a fetal position, his back to him.

"What did you do to my brother?"

Sam stepped round Alastair realising that he was trapping himself and Dean inside the room, but not really caring at that moment. His only aim was to check if Dean was ok. His brother's eyes were shut, his face a grimace and Sam could see the little trail of sweat and tears on it. He lifted his head and glared at the demon. "What did you do to him?"

Alastair put the bottle down and examined his nails before looking at Sam with a bored expression on his face. "I didn't do anything to him…I simply let some old friends in who wanted to say hi."

Sam looked at him, puzzled at first but then he reached down and pulled Dean's shirt back. There was a burn on his brother's chest…right across the tattoo that protected him from possession. "Why? I can pull whatever is in him right out…but you know that, so why bother?"

"I need you to do something for me and you are so like your brother I knew that torturing you would take to long." Dean moaned as if on cue and Alastair smiled. "I decided it would be much easier to torture your brother instead…and it would even the score as well. I was very disappointed to lose him…and then he hit me…so not polite."

Dean coughed distracting Sam and he watched as and a little trickle of blood escaped down his brother's chin.

"What are you doing to him?" Sam lifted Dean's head onto his lap and gently stroked his hair. Dean's moan changed to a pain filled whimper. Sam shot an angry look at Alastair. "Stop it!"

Alastair ignored the plea. He laid his hands down on his knees, smoothing the wrinkles out in his suit trousers and picking at the little pieces of lint that clung to him. Sam wanted to reach up and strangle him. Alastair looked at him and smiled and Sam wondered if the demon could read his thoughts.

"I want you to use your ability to get some people I want back downstairs where they belong. If you help me…" Alastair lent down and smiled serenely at him. "…I'll leave Dean alone. For now." He went back to examining his nails.

"If you don't stop this right now I'll just drag the demon out of him myself and then…then I'm going to kill you." Sam shifted to free his hand, swinging it back across his back and grabbing the hilt of Ruby's knife.

_Maybe if I hurt him bad enough I can exorcise him._

Sam went to stand up but Alastair stopped him with a hand. "So like him…such a brave front even when you know that it's hopeless." Alastair leaned forward to him. "Daddy taught you well." Alastair stood and walked to the door, stopping and turning as he reached it.

"Oh, and I wouldn't try to pull the demon out of him by the way…if you do, it'll kill him…and there's more than one. I fused their souls to your brother's soul…you exorcise them…you exorcise him right alone with them. I'll call you with the name and the place where the first one I want is."

Sam looked at him, fighting down again the urge just to rush him and stick him with the knife. "How will I know what they'll look like?"

"Dean will be able to see them, just like he could before he went to Hell and if not I'm sure your little hell whore will help. You've got seven targets and five days or I'm taking him back and not even the angels will be able to help him this time." Alastair walked back over and pulled Sam to his feet, Dean still held in his grasp. "I'll take him so deep that this time not even God himself will be able to reach him…do I make myself clear?"

"Crystal." Sam spat the word at him. "If Dean dies I'll kill you myself…even if I have to march into Hell to do it…do I make _myself_ clear?"

Alastair made a noise that made Sam's blood chill. "As I said…so like him." Alastair turned and with that he was gone.

Sam pulled Dean up onto the bed and turned his head to face him, pulling his phone from his pocket as he did. "Dean? Dean!" He gently slapped his brother's face and smiled as he opened his eyes. "Hey." Dean's face was etched with pain. "It's gonna be ok, I'm gonna fix this." He rubbed his hand gently over his brother's head as he used the other to call up the name he was looking for on his phone and waited for the call to connect.

"Ruby, I need you….I'll explain when you get here."

He got up and walked to the bathroom. He took a moment to calm himself at the sink, then wet a cloth, walking back through he grabbed one of the bottle of water from the table and then sat down again on the edge of the bed. Dean was curled back in a ball, his knees pulled tightly to his chest, a low moan escaping him. Sam rolled him over to face him and placed the cloth on his head. "Drink some of this." He lifted Dean's head and forced some water into his brother's throat.

Dean's face was deathly pale except for the black rings surrounding his eyes and his breathing was rough and pain filled. Sam brought a cover over him and tucked it round him. The thought of just trying the exorcism ran briefly through his head but he knew that at the moment he was to scared to try, to scared to take the risk.

He jumped as the hand touched his shoulder. "What happened to him?" Sam looked up into Ruby's worried eyes.

"He's possessed but it not a normal possession, Alastair forced this, he said that he had fused the demon's souls to Dean own, that I couldn't exorcise them without Dean going too." Sam felt the words spill over themselves as they left his mouth, the panic starting to grip him sounding in his voice.

"Easy there." Ruby walked round the bed and turned Dean's head to face her. "Did he say why he did this? And souls…as in plural?"

Sam nodded and looked up from Dean into Ruby's face. "He wants to use me, my ability. There are some demons that he wants put back in Hell and he says that if I do it he'll stop this and that if I don't…he'll take Dean back with him."

Ruby looked stunned. "Why does he need you to send them packing back to Hell, he could do that himself?" She turned to Dean and Sam watched the expression that crossed her face. Compassion and a cold realisation showed on the face of the demon as she stared down at his brother. "This so isn't about what you can do or can't do for him. It's a game. He wants to torture Dean, you're just a little added bonus, a side show for his amusement…besides he knows that it'll piss off the angels as well…at you and at him. He's pissed at them for taking his favourite toy, your brother, and not giving it back so now…like any spoiled child he's broken it…so no one can play with it."

"My brother isn't a toy for them to play with or fight over!" Sam reached down and took Dean's hand. "Why would he do that?"

"Because he can…because that's what Alastair does, he plays games. Sick, twisted, torture games. He enjoys it, gets off on it...and he's good at it." Sam so didn't like the pity that showed in Ruby's eyes as she looked at his brother again.

"Can you help Dean?" Sam's voice broke as he spoke.

Ruby lent over and touched his face. "I'll try. First we need to know what we're dealing with." She dropped her hand from Sam to Dean's face.

"Dean?" Her voice was soft and low as she spoke. "Dean, it's Ruby. I need you to fight this Dean. I need you to talk to me, tell me how many there are with you, to help you, can you do that Dean, can you tell me how many there are?"

Dean's face twisted with pain again and he cried out. Ruby tightened her grip on his face. "Dean, I need to know."

They watched as Dean's eye flicked opened and Sam had to look away as the green eyes of his brother flipped to the black of the demon's inside.

"I'm sorry, Dean can't come out just now and play, he's been a very naughty boy and I'm afraid that he's being punished for it…but if you'd like to leave a message for him…." The voice tailed off into a strangled laugh and Dean sat up and grabbed Sam's jacket. "Don't worry, we won't kill him, that's not in the rules, but believe me, by the time we're finished with him…he'll wish we had."

"Who are you?" Sam dropped his eyes as he spoke, he couldn't look at Dean's face knowing that this thing look back at him with it just now wasn't his brother.

The demon inside Dean was delighted by Sam's distress, this was going to be more fun than he had imagined and he had imagined a lot since Alastair had told him of his little plan.

"Ask your brother…he knows who we are, he knows why we're here and he _knows_ what we're going to do to him."

A little chortle escaped Dean's lips and then he gave a scream of pain and collapsed back on the bed, eyes closing and his body going limp.


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's Chapter Notes:**

HI

Just a little chapter to get everyone on the road and in the right places.

Italics are Dean's thoughts and feelings.

King's Pawn To Open

_He could hear them now, inside his head, talking to him, telling him what they were going to do to him and he knew who they were. He thought that dreaming about them had been bad but now…now they were inside him, joined to him somehow and he could feel their hatred and their rage. _

_He couldn't move, his body felt totally disconnected from him and yet every nerve end tingled and he could feel the ache of their presence in his muscles as their hands tore him apart from the inside. Hard fingers ripping at soft flesh. He heard the words that he had cried out so often in his sleep yet he knew he hadn't spoken them aloud. _

_"I'm sorry…please…forgive me…I had to…I just couldn't do it any longer…I couldn't take anymore…please. Please don't do this to me." He felt the sob that ran through him and heard them laugh as he cried. _

_He knew even as he asked for it that there would be no forgiveness, they had been given their chance at revenge…and they were going to take it. He would have._

_He heard a voice that he recognised, it whispered inside him. "Did you listen when we begged Dean? Did you show us mercy when we craved it? Did you stop when we cried?" _

_He could see their faces now, feel their hands tug at his very core, rip at his flesh and he was allowed to let out the real scream that was waiting in his throat for it's release. _

_---_

Sam pinned Dean down as he jerked under him and nearly toppled them both to the floor. The scream that escaped his brother caused tears to form in Sam's eyes. Dean screamed again and Sam realised that he could see the rips appear on his brother's arms only to instantly heal, invisible claws were tearing at Dean's flesh only unlike the hell hounds, the damage was from the inside out and no release would be found in death, not this time.

His panic filled him. "Hurry Ruby!"

He watched as Ruby cradled Dean's head as she forced the liquid between his lips. "Come on Dean, I need you to drink this."

Sam watched as his brother gagged on it for about the fifth time and Ruby lost her temper. She forced Dean's lips apart and poured the liquid in until he was choking on it.

"Ruby!" Sam pulled the glass from her hand. "For God's sake, what are you trying to do to him, kill him."

"Probably be better off. "Ruby mumbled the words under her breath and then she turned to Sam. "Sorry, I didn't mean that."

Sam just stood there looking at her.

"Yeah she did." They both turned and stared at the figure on the bed. Dean's eyes where opened and they were his eyes, for the moment at least. Sam watched his brother's chest heave as he literally fought down the demons inside.

"What is it with you and making me drink vile stuff? You hate me that much? Don't answer that…I might take offence." Sam was glad to hear Dean's snark but it had a pained edge to it, he coughed and screwed up his face. "What was that?" He coughed again and then groaned and put his hands to his head, revelling in the fact that, for the moment at least, he had control again over his own limbs.

"Just a little something to keep your friends inside occupied for a while and let you talk to us…it won't work for long though."

Sam sat down next to his brother. "What did he do to you? How many are there? What do they want?"

Dean dropped his hands from his head to over his eyes. "God Sam, one question I can't answer at a time."

Ruby spoke turning his attention back to her. "How many are there?" She sat on the bed next to Dean.

Dean's voice had a shake in it when he spoke. "Ten …maybe twelve, there's too many voices…I can't really tell." Dean voiced his own question to his brother. "What did he want with you?"

"He wants me to exorcise a few demons for him and if I do it quickly enough he'll let you go."

Dean had moved his hands and he watched the look that Ruby threw Sam.

He sat up and glared at his brother. "You're not doing that, do you hear me. I don't care if they threaten to send me back or if they rip my friggin' heart out…I don't want you using your little mind trick. D'you understand?" Sam went to protest but Dean held up his hand to fend it off and then he paled and gripped his chest, coughing again. He lifted his hand back to his face and sighed as it came away from his nose bloody. Sam knelt beside him to check him but Dean had turned his attention back to Ruby. "What was the look for?"

Ruby looked at Sam again and Dean reached forward and grabbed her face. "Don't look at him, I asked you a question. Answer me."

She sighed. "I think that he's playing with Sam's head to get at you. He doesn't really need Sam to do this for him. He wants to see you suffer, adding Sam to the mixture just makes it worse for you and gives him a better game to play. He wants to torture you and he knows that Sam using his powers cause of you will do that and annoy the angels as an extra kick. Win-Win as far as he is concerned."

"Surely he knows that Sam could just use it on me?" Dean looked up at Sam and his brother could see the pain flickering through his eyes.

Sam took Dean's hand and his worry spiked as Dean made no effort to move away from his touch. "No, he did something, fused souls to yours somehow, I get them out…you go with them. I don't know whether he was lying or not…I suppose I couldn't try but if he's telling the truth…it's a helluva risk."

Ruby interrupted. "Alastair isn't one for empty threat, is he Dean?"

"No." Dean groaned and closed his eyes.

"Dean?"

"M'ok Sam, so any other options?" Ruby shook her head.

"Not really…unless…"

Dean and Sam both looked at her curiously.

"…unless we ask the winged wonders for help." She looked down at her hands. "I could always just stay out of the way for a while…I don't think they like me very much." She grinned at them both as she spoke and then grew serious. "They saved you once, maybe they could help with this."

"One little problem with that." Dean paused, he could feel himself starting to slip, feel them rising up against him, his insides started to ache again.

Ruby put a hand on his shoulder. "It's wearing off." It wasn't a question.

"Yeah." He shifted round her and lay back down on the bed, studiously ignoring his brother's worried face. "I don't now how to contact them, they just kinda show up when _they_ need us."

"I'll see if I can figure out a way to draw their attention, for now though we'll just have to do what he wants." Ruby watched as Dean closed his eyes and his breathing started to hitch again.

Sam leant over his brother. "You never told us who they were, the demons inside you…or what they want?"

Dean opened his eyes. "Really, you don't want to know who they are…believe me and they've got what they want Sammy…me." Dean was drifting now, he could feel himself dropping down inside, could feel their hands grip him and pull him back into himself.

Sam felt Dean's grip tighten on his hand.

"Dean?"

The last thing he heard was Sam's voice as he went under again.

---

_Dean felt like he was watching a movie. He could see his brother and Ruby leaning over him, concern etched on both their faces, and he wanted to reach back out to Sam and tell him not to do anything foolish, that it was ok, that he deserved this. He wanted to let him know that he could cope...he had faced worse. _

_A movement in the corner of his vision caught his eye. He watched as Ruby stepped away from him and Alastair drifted into her place, his voice sounding in Dean's ear even as he watched the scene in front of him. _

_"Does it hurt yet Dean? Your own little piece of hell on earth. Can you hear them? Can you feel them tearing at you?" Alastair gave a dark chuckle. " Do you like the little task that I set your brother? A little push further into the darkness inside him Dean, and it's your fault again. How does that make you feel Dean? Does it eat you up that he didn't do as you asked, you went to Hell to save him Dean, you wanted only one thing of him and he still couldn't do what he was told. Not even for you. He started his journey down the dark road when you weren't here to stop him and now you don't think you can. Whether he plays this game or not Dean he's going to slip sooner or later and when he does…you'll both be mine and I'll welcome you back to Hell with open arms." _

_Dean felt a shudder run through him as Alastair gently lifted his hand and ran it through Dean's hair. He watched as the demon gripped his hair tight and pulled back his head. _

_"Let the game's begin then, eh?" _

_And then Dean was nothing again but pain as he slipped back inside his own frame. _

_He heard Alastair laugh as Sam's phone started to ring and then the hands reached for him and pulled him back into the game of their own. _

_---_

Sam looked down at the screen in front of him and frowned.

"What is it?"

"Seems Alastair knows a thing or two about my family." He hadn't raised his eyes from the screen.

"Why?"

"It's co-ordinates…just like my dad used to do. There's a name and a message."

"What's the message?"

"We've gotta take Dean with us. Alastair will let him tell us who it is when we get there."

Ruby looked over at the now still form on the bed, only the movement of his eyes behind his shuttered lids showing that Dean was not resting. "How the heck is he going to do that?"

Sam looked up. "Doesn't say. Let's go…time's wasting."

"I'll help you get Dean into the car but I'm not coming with you. I'm going to hunt down Castiel and see if I can get him to help…I mean they want Dean alive as much as we do. I just hope Mr Sunshine isn't with him."

Sam smiled at her. "Did you mean that?"

Ruby looked puzzled. "Mean what?"

"_We_ want Dean alive? I thought you didn't like my brother?"

"I did and I don't. I just know how much he means to you so if that's what you want then that's what I want."

Sam gently lifted his brother off the bed, struggling for a minute before he adjusted to the weight in his arms. "Admit it…he's growing on you…I think he's getting used to you too."

"Yeah, well…warts grow on you too, doesn't still mean that you wouldn't get rid of them if you could. It's safer for you when he's around…let's just leave it at that."

Ruby helped Sam get Dean settled in the car and then turned to leave. Sam reached for her arm and pulled her into his arms, briefly touching his lips to her forehead. "Be careful."

"You too." She watched as Sam climbed into the car to leave then flicked out her phone. There was only one person that she knew had managed to contact the angels before and she needed to talk to her, perhaps she could use her to send Castiel a message.

She called Pamela Barnes but somehow she didn't think that she would be thrilled to hear from her.

**Chapter End Notes:**

Hope you like, will up the pace next time!

Cheers Mary xx

Thank you for you reviews so far, please keep them coming.


	3. Chapter 3

**Author's Chapter Notes:**

Hi, you know everytime I write the name Pamela Barnes down I get the Dallas theme in my head. Go figure! (Makes me want to check the shower for dead men appearing in it too!) So has to be a story plot there! *laughs*

Anyway - Ruby goes to try and get help, and Alastair shows that he is not without humour as he sends the boys after their first target...although all does not go to plan.

Two Knights Defense

Pamela closed the phone on Ruby and sighed.

She had known that the damned Winchesters were going to be trouble before she had even agreed to help Bobby but she had never reckoned on them being this much.

She knew that it wasn't their fault that she had ended up blind…she had pushed her luck to the limit and got burned…literally and badly. They wouldn't have asked her for her help if they'd known that she would end up as badly hurt as she had been, that just wasn't how these boys worked. She rubbed her sightless eyes and threw some candles down on the table.

No, the boys were as big a victim in this as she was and she wanted to help them, needed to help them…she just wasn't sure why. She smiled…hell it wasn't that bad really…the last image that was seared into her brain before her eyes fried was Dean Winchester's pretty, pretty face, she thought that there could be worst things that she could be seeing in her dreams…like the things she knew he was...the things she had seen when he had taken her hand to help her from the car the day they had asked for her help with Anna. She had run from them then…she wasn't going to do it again.

She knew that sooner or later she was going to get stuck in this war that the Winchesters had been dragged into…she might as well go in under her own terms as be thrown in under someone else's. She sat down to wait for Ruby.

----

Ruby stopped to let her eyes adjust to the gloom in the room that she had just entered. She could just make out Pamela walking in front of her and she stood there watching as the older woman moved effortlessly round the room collecting the things that she would need and placing them on the table.

Pamela's voice tore her from her reverie. "Don't just stand there, here." She caught the box of matches that was deftly thrown at her. "Light the candles for me and then sit in the nearest chair to the door."

Ruby did as she was told. "I wasn't sure that you'd help me…I mean after what the angels did to you and everything."

"Sister I really want to be as hell and far as gone from all things Winchester as I possibly can…but, seeing as how I can't see to go anywhere I figure I may as well throw my hat into the ring and see what ends up buried under it…I only hope it isn't me!" She laughed a dry laugh and sat in the seat opposite Ruby. She lent over the table and stared sightlessly into Ruby's eyes. "You sure about this, I mean look at me and all I was trying to do was look."

"I'm sure." Ruby swallowed hard, rubbed her hands on her jeans and then reached across to take Pamela's own. "Ok then…let's do this."

---

Ruby could feel Pamela's hand shake slightly as she started the ritual. She watched as the other woman laid her other hand over her eyes.

"I invoke, conjure and command you….come to us Castiel." Ruby felt the oppressive nature in the room grow as Pamela repeated the words. Something shifted in the dark, a faint, fleeting glimpse of an image and then Pamela stopped talking and dropped her head. "Pamela?" Ruby could feel the fear building in her and for a moment she was tempted to run but before she could give action to the thought Pamela gripped her hand tighter.

"What do _you _want?" The voice was low and menacing. "Why would you of all things want to speak with me?" Pamela was channelling the angel.

"I…I need your help…it's Dean…" Pamela lifted her head and Ruby had to look away from the light that shone through her eyes, it touch her skin and she could feel the burn. Ruby struggled to finish her words. "He needs your help…Alastair."

"I know what Alastair has done…I cannot help. My orders forbid it. His brother can help him can he not?"

"No…if he helps then Dean goes back…Alastair will make sure of it."

"Then Sam must complete the task that he was given. He will see then if you can truly trust a demon."

Ruby was sure there was a smirk on Pamela's face as she spoke but she couldn't look to check. Ruby felt a little indignation at the thinly veiled attack on her. "He can trust me…I thought you were sent to help Dean? Why won't you? He needs your help."

" I was sent to save him but we must all pay a penance for our sins Ruby…you should know that…isn't that why you are helping them? For penance…or do you have another reason? Perhaps you want to be queen to a king one day?" A soft laugh floated in the room.

"I want to help them that's all. I thought that was what you wanted too but I can see that I'm wasting my time here. I thought you were supposed to care all the time, not just when it suits you. You know, it kinda makes me glad I'm just a heartless bitch demon and not a wondrous angel of the lord." She broke the connection with Pamela and stood to go.

His voice stopped her, it's tone different. "I will see what I can do." He paused. "Perhaps Alastair isn't as in charge of this situation as he would like to think. We might all be pawns in this game Ruby…watch that you don't get in the way."

Ruby looked up. "What do you mean?"

Pamela jerked and then slumped over the table and Ruby stepped forward. "Pamela? Pamela?" She watched as the older woman gathered herself and then looked up at her.

"Did you get what you wanted?" Her voice was frail and tired sounding. "I really don't like that guy.

"No, but I don't think he's an innocent in all this as an angel should be. I needed to go help Sam…are you ok?"

Pamela ran a hand through her hair and put her dark glasses on. "I'm fine…just go help the boys and if you need me?...call."

---

_He hated the fact that he couldn't control his own body, that he was jut as much a prisoner in his skin at the moment as the ones that Alastair had chosen to torture him. The sensation that he'd hope to never feel again rippled through him as the hands of those sent to defile his insides ripped into his flesh, slashed muscle from bone, taking him down to the point of the sweet release that he prayed death would bring to him. _

_It was then that he would feel it, that hated sensation, the tingle of healing, feel it creeping through his bruised and battered body, feel it wash away the graffiti on his soul, cleansing the canvas for the next artist to display his work upon. Dean had hated the healing more than he had hated the destruction...one was a step towards the oblivion that he had come to crave and the other the reminder that he would never reach it, the reminder that his torment would be eternal. _

_He screamed in silence as the wheel revolved again. _

_"Having fun there Dean" Alastair was here with him, inside and he was once again tied to the rack, his victims waiting to take their turn at visiting the pain he had inflicted on them back on him. _

_"I've found an old friend for you to play with Dean? A little guest of honour at your party. Do you remember who this is?" _

_Dean caught the flash of a white coat and then the hands closed against his head. The words sent shivers through him as realisation broke. "Don't be afraid. I'm going to help you. I'm going to make you all better." _

_"Ellicott…" _

_Alastair smiled. "I've got a job for you Dean and then I'll let the good doctor play a while." _

_As Dean watched Alastair examining his nails in that all to familiar gesture of boredom he thought how much he'd like to rip them from him. Alastair looked up at him and smiled. "That's my boy." _

_A voice called his name and he turned his head. _

_"Go to your brother, we can wait." Alastair's soft chuckle sounded in his head again. _

_--- _

The co-ordinates has been for a small town and Sam almost laughed at the demon's twisted little joke. He was taking his brother back to Hell, except this one was in Michigan and he didn't have to die to get there.

Sam pulled the Impala into the side of the road and cast a worried glance at his brother. Dean's breathing was so shallow and his face so pale that Sam couldn't fight the urge to lean over and check for his brother's pulse. He wished he hadn't. Dean's heart was racing.

Sam jumped as his phone rang and he sat back up and flicked it open.

"He still breathing there Sammy? Brother looks awfully pale to me. I wonder just were all that blood's gone Sammy, what do you think?"

"I think that you don't call me Sammy…only he gets to do that."

"Sa…mm…y." The demon drawled his name out. "…such hostility! Dean and me we're practically blood you know…that should count for a few allowances don'tcha think?" Alastair chuckled in his ear. "The guy you're looking for goes under the name of Richard White. There's a bar at the end of the main street, I want you to go in and do it right there in the bar…if he leaves…your brother doesn't. Do you understand me?"

Sam voice was full of disbelief that he couldn't hide. "You want me to go into a bar, in broad daylight and pull the demon out this guy?"

"Well it'll be dark in the bar Sammy…although admittedly not that dark…but still I'm sure you'll manage…it's not that hard an instruction to follow Sam now is it? Time to wake up sleeping beauty…but he's on a clock…take too long and Dean might turn into a pumpkin."

Sam snorted." I think you've got you fairy tales a little mixed there."

"Maybe I have…maybe I haven't. Dean'll be able to see who it is you are looking for. Don't disappoint me Sammy…happy hunting."

Sam glanced at his brother again. Dean was going to go nuts. There was no way he was going to let Sam do this with an audience, perhaps he'd find away round it. "Then again at the moment I don't really see how you'd be able to stop me." He touched Dean's forehead out of habit and frowned at the coldness of his skin.

Sam cranked the heater up full and pulled out into the little trickle of traffic snaking through the town.

---

The bar had been easy to find, it had a large sign that swung lazily in the breeze and proudly proclaimed the bar's name as The Damned Inn.

Sam shook his head. "You're kidding me!"

He parked the car as close as he could get and got out and circled to the passenger side.

"Dean?" He called his brother's name softly and was rewarded with a soft moan and Dean stirred and opened his eyes.

Dean wretched.

The healing sensation made him feel sick but he pushed down the bile that was sitting in his throat and tried to calm himself. He could still feel Ellicott's hands and eyes on him and he tried not to think about what was waiting for him when they were done here. "Where are we?" His voice sounded strained even to him.

Sam look sheepish and Dean raised his eyebrows at him.

"We're in Hell." Dean took in Sam's dead pan face and realised that his brother wasn't making some kind of sick joke. "Really this town...it's name is Hell."

"If it is…it's colder than I remember." He gave Sam a weak smile. "Alastair does have his moments…"

"You look like shit big brother." Sam eased his arm under Dean's shoulders and pulled him out of the car.

Dean closed his eyes and bit his lip as another wave of nausea rolled through him. "You try entertaining the guests from hell and their all night partying, see how you do." Dean lent heavily on the car door and tried to catch his balance as he spoke.

"You ok?" Sam's worried face floated briefly in front of him and just for a minute he thought he was going down but then his legs decided to come back online and he turned to Sam.

"I feel like someone stirred my inside with a spoon, apart from that…I'm peachy." A half hearted grin crossed his face.

"Think you can manage over to the door?"

Dean smiled but shook his head. "Not under my own steam." The admission scared him almost as much as it worried his brother.

"Ok." Sam put his arm under Dean's and almost dragged him over to the front door of the bar.

"So manly." Dean managed a small laugh that quickly however turned to a lung wrenching cough.

"Serves you right….you ok?" Sam switched from annoyed to concerned in a heartbeat as Dean's face reddened as he struggled to catch a breath. "Come on…let's get you inside."

Sam swung the door opened and felt it as Dean shifted his weight onto his own feet and promptly swayed back against him. Sam steadied him with a hand as they walked through the doors together.

"Hunters." Dean whispered the word as he let Sam guide him to a seat in the corner.

_Perfect,_ Sam thought,_ just perfect._ "Do you see him?" Sam looked at Dean to see that he was already scanning the room.

"Nah, I don't see anything out of the…wait…there." A slow smile crossed his brother's face. "See the guy that's just headed for the john?" Sam nodded. "That our guy. Help me up."

Sam breathed a sigh of relief at the reprieve he had just been handed, no audience after all. "No you wait here, I'll just be a minute."

Dean gripped his arm harder than Sam would have thought he'd have strength to. "No way…we're doing this together…even if I have to crawl across the floor after you, besides I can watch the door."

"Here then…take this." Sam slipped him Ruby's knife. "Just in case."

Dean nodded and the knife disappeared inside his jacket.

Sam helped Dean up and they slowly crossed the floor, Dean praying all the time that the little group of hunters in the corner didn't know or recognise them. He pulled the collar of his jacket up to hide his face knowing that there was nothing he could do about the conspicuousness that was his giant of a brother.

They pushed through the toilet door and the man was standing at the sinks. Dean lent back against the door and Sam waited until the man turned before he raised his hand.

"You!" The black flashed in his eyes and he started forward only to be frozen in his tracks as Sam ramped up his act.

The black smoke was just starting to drift slowly from the face in front of him when Sam heard the moan from behind, he looked in the mirror behind the demon and was horror struck as the realisation of what was happening hit him.

Dean was caught in the moment, as mesmorised as the demon was as Sam started the extraction, then he felt the little tug inside and then...well then he couldn't breathe.

"Sam…" It was a strangled noise.

Sam turned, distracted and confused but still holding the demon at bay. Dean was hanging onto the door handle for grim death as the black smoke slowly curled from his lips. His brother was too close to the floor show…instead of being a spectator he had unwittingly became part of the act.

Sam was exorcising his brother as well as the target.

The demon in front of him chuckled.

"Well smart ass…what are you gonna do now….kill me, you kill him. Let me go…and I'll finish you both."

**Chapter End Notes:**

Few notes - Hell is a real town in Michigan - I couldn't resist! I've never been and I don't know if there is even a bar in the place but there is in my story!!

Hope you like, I will try to keep the updates coming at a regular pace.


	4. Chapter 4

Thanks for the reviews, sorry that I haven't updated my replies yet, it's been kinda crazy here!

So Sam was exorcising a demon and his brother was going too…..

White Knight, Black Queen

_Dean was choking. _

_His lungs felt as if they were liquefying as he felt the demons inside him start to be dragged from him. He managed to force out his brother's name and then he was going with them, being pulled along with them against his will. He could feel the cool metal of the door handle in his grip and he tried to focus on that, use it as an anchor to keep him here, keep him upright. He felt the pull weaken and hoped for a moment that he had somehow managed it, but then he realised that Sam had eased off, going from exorcising the demon to just holding it there…and holding him and the others there to…just on the edge of the abyss, looking down at the darkness that waited patiently to rise up and claim them all. _

_--- _

Sam could feel the demon struggling against his hold and he could sense the others, including his brother hovering there, silently waiting to see if he was going to seal their fate too and sent them back. They weren't struggling for they knew that sooner or later that was where they were going to end up and besides it wasn't as if he was going to deprive them of their fun, Dean was going to go with them, the game for them would not end here.

The demon took one more step towards him and Sam felt a little piece of panic grip him…then he could hear her.

Ruby's voice was in his head then, patient, guiding him, tell him to concentrate…to focus on the task in hand…telling him that he could do this and then Dean's voice joined hers. _That's it Sammy, keep your eyes on the target…only on the target…you can do this Sammy…I know you can. _His brother's voice was a memory from another time but it helped to steady him and it set his resolve. This demon was going down but he was damned if his brother was going too, not by his hand.

He moved round, away from Dean, further into the room, all the while keeping an eye on his target and his brother. He forced himself to seek out the one that he was looking for in the little group that was in his head, all under his control, and he reached out for just him, focused on just him. He felt him slip into his grasp and the demon in front of him gave a strangled yelp and slowly slid to it knees, the eyes of its host wide with disbelief.

Sam calmed…this was it, this was the moment that he had to juice up the act but he was aware that to do so might prove too much for him, that he might not be able to control it. He closed his eyes and brought up the images of his brother and the other man in his head as he raised his other hand.

Sam wavered for just a moment. _I can do this…I have to do this._ Then he had him again…just him alone.

He felt the blood start to trickle down his face with the tremendous effort of blocking out the others, blocking out Dean and making himself only take this one. He had never had to do this before, it had always just been a straight fight, like gunfighters at dawn, kill or be killed, but this was different, this was much harder…and the price of failure was unthinkable.

Slowly and tenuously he started to pull the demon out. He watched as the black smoke curled lazily from its host's mouth, watched as it hung in the air and then he couldn't resist a quick glance to his brother. Dean was on his knees now, his grip on the door lost, head up but body slumped again the frame of the door, eyes watching him. Little tendrils of smoke drifted lazily from his brother's lips and nose but Sam realised that he had stayed his execution…that he had this under his control.

He flicked his attention back, breathed deeply and finished the job at hand.

---

_Dean wondered briefly just how strong his brother's ability had got that he had almost dragged himself and a dozen or so demons clean out of him and then he realised that he didn't really want to know. _

_It was like a line up but instead of Sam picking the guilty party and him having to take a step forwards Dean felt it as all the rest of them were pushed back, as his brother pushed them back, seeking and singling out his goal. _

_He slid to his knees and watched as Sam moved round and away from him, raising his other hand and holding him and the souls within him steady. _

_For a brief moment the choking sensation filled him again as Sam's control wavered slightly and then it was being forced down, just as he and the others were forced back into him. _

_He felt the push against him increase, felt the slide back into his own skin quicken as Sam got a control on what he was doing. He watched then, as the one Sam had sought out was pulled away from them, fighting and screaming as he went… dragged off down in the waiting darkness. _

_Dean shut his eyes as he felt the bitter chill that was his brother's touch reach right down through his soul. _

---

Sam's will was the only thing that was keeping Dean on his knees and when his brother broke his hold Dean simply slumped bonelessly to the floor. He tried to steady his breathing and then put a hand under himself to push up but the effort was just too much and he let his head rest on the floor, the coldness of the tiles mirroring the chill that ran through his body.

Warm hands touched his face and he struggled to open his eyes, to let Sam know that he was alright. He was drained completely. He was dragged into a sitting position, propped against what he thought was a bin and then watched as Sam went over, checked the guy on the floor and then dragged him into the cubicle. Sam locked the door from the outside and then hurried back to him.

"Dean?" He watched as Sam ran his hand over the side of his face and lifted it to look him in the eye. "Dean? Can you talk to me…are you ok? I'm sorry; I didn't know that would happen." Sam put his arm under Dean's shoulders again and hoisted him to his feet.

Dean realised that even the demons in him were quiet again for the moment and he wasn't sure if it was Alastair's doing or if they were still subdued by the closeness of his brother's presence…he found he didn't really care.

Sam's voice was more insistent this time, more like…well more like his father's. "Dean…" Dean closed his eyes briefly and drifted, almost waited for the 'son' that his dad always followed his name with when he wanted him to do something that he knew would tax Dean to his limits…he was almost surprised when it didn't come. "Help me here…" _That was more like Sammy now. "_Do you hear me…I need your help to get us out of here."

"Ok." It took almost every ounce of strength he had to summon the words to his lips, but it was a start. He forced his legs to move, forced them to carry a bit of the load. He leaned heavily still on Sam though as they walked, the bar was a mere blur as his brother steered him through it, Dean's full concentration on the monumental effort required to put one foot in front of the other. Somehow he made it to the front door and as they passed through he heard Sam's phone ring.

---

"Well done…I didn't know that you had _that_ in you, maybe a bit further down that road than you thought eh Sammy? Might have to raise the stakes here a bit Sam…make the next one more of a challenge, then again, maybe not. You almost lost him there Sammy though…but a nice recovery, still Dean doesn't look so good does he?"

Alastair's voice was light and teasing as he spoke. "Yeah Dean…I mean that had to have hurt him right? Not just watching you this time, but feeling it too. .a little stab through his heart."

Alastair paused and then his voice changed, delight filtering into it. "He's afraid of you but you know that? If I can feel it then I know that you can…and your brother isn't afraid of much I'll tell you that…the things he withstood in Hell before he broke…but the hopeless of his struggle got to him in the end, why fight when there's nothing left to fight for. That's what gets to all of them eventually. The futility of fighting the inevitable, fighting your destiny. It's much better if you just don't fight it."

Alastair paused to let the words sink in.

"I wonder how he feels now that he knows just how far you strayed without him, he took all that pain, did things that he'd never dreamed that he was capable of, and for what? He comes home to find that you disobeyed him anyway. You took his sacrifice and threw it back in his face."

"That's not true...I kept fighting like he asked me too." Dean turned his head slightly to look at him, his eyes questioning and bright against his chalk white skin.

Alastair was smiling, Sam could just tell. "Just not the _way_ he asked though. Not the way he does, the way he wanted you to."

"Sam…" Dean's voice tore him from the conversation. "I think I'm gonna…" Sam didn't need Dean to finish the sentence, the look on his face signalled his intentions. Sam dropped his phone into his pocket and caught Dean as he went down.

"Shit, come on Dean, stay with me." Sam shouldered all of his brother's weight against him and started moving for the car.

"Need a hand?" He turned and faced the man that came out of the bar behind him.

"No, I got him." Sam shrugged Dean further up against him as the man rounded to his other side and eased some of his burden.

"It's ok, I don't mind. He looks drunk but I don't smell any alcohol. What's wrong with him?"

Sam knew that this man had been with the hunter's in the bar, he was probably the only one in the place that had been as tall as he was and he had caught Sam's attention as they had walked through. The man was older than Dean, tall and slim like himself but he had Dean's colouring and almost the same shade of green eyes. He smiled and there was a kindness in his face.

Sam didn't want to be rude. "Ate something that didn't agree with him. He'll be fine in an hour or so. Car's over there."

They took Dean over to the car in silence and Sam dropped him gently on the front seat, winching slightly as Dean let out a long pain filled moan.

"Sure he doesn't need a hospital…he looks like death."

"Dean's fine, I'm sure…thanks." Sam closed the door on Dean and walked away round the back of the car. The man turned and leaned on the roof and Sam paused as he got to the other side. A hand was extended across the roof.

"Well I hope Dean keeps better……" It was obvious that he was waiting for Sam to tell him his name.

"Name's Sam." Sam took the hand and shook it and then watched as the man clasped his hands on top of the car stirring a memory that Sam couldn't quite fully reach of Dean in that self same pose.

"Sam…mine's Robert. Perhaps see you around again Sam, and Dean too. Nice car…you had her long?" He stepped back and ran a hand along the top of the car, the motion almost a caress.

"Forever…I need to go, my brother and all…"

"Yeah sorry, just I knew someone that had a car just like this…brought back some memories. Good luck." With that he turned and walked away, stopped at a truck parked further down the street and then with one last glance, he climbed in and drove away.

Sam stared for a moment after him and then turned and headed back to the motel.

---

Ruby had been livid and pacing when they'd got back to the motel and had chewed Sam's ears the whole time they were getting Dean inside.

"You were supposed to call me and let me know where you were!"

"No I wasn't."

"I asked you to!"

Sam was indignant. "No…you didn't. God it's like arguing with him…he always right too."

"Well you should have known to anyway." Ruby deflated slightly and looked at Dean, lying back, out of it, on the bed. "How did it go?"

"Fine, job's done, one down and six to go."

"Is he alright?" Ruby walked over and stood looking over Dean.

"I think so…there was a little hitch." Sam walked over to stand beside her.

"A hitch?" Ruby turned on him. "I thought you said it went fine."

"It did, it's just that Dean was a bit too close when I tried to yank the demon out and…" Sam hesitated the though of what had almost happened making him feel sick. "…he nearly went to."

"How close?" Ruby looked back down at Dean. "Did he speak to you afterwards?"

"Dean was beside me, I didn't realise that it would affect him and yeah he was still there when I was finished."

"How did you get round it, how did you manage to just get the demon?"

"I did what you told me too…I concentrated. I don't know, I just kinda latched onto its essence and it worked."

"So you can listen when people tell you things…I'm impressed." She smiled and then a look across her face.

"Are you channelling my brother?" Sam's tone made her laugh.

"No…thank god. So you managed to pick one from the crowd? That's good Sam…that's real good."

"Why…'cos I'm one step closer to falling in the pit?" It came out more bitter than he had intended, his worry for his brother overriding his concern for Ruby's feelings.

"No." Ruby riled at the accusation in his voice. "It means I might have an idea of how to save your brother…but I need that damned angel of his to help and he won't. Not in his orders apparently and I ain't' asking his friend. He's a little _too_ righteous for my demon blood."

"Mine too." Sam smiled at her.

Dean voice made then both look down. "Sammy, making jokes about the demon blood, what is the world coming too." Dean tried to move and felt the wave of nausea hit him the minute he did. "Sam."

Sam was ahead of him, forcing his head off the edge of the bed and into the waste bin. Dean dry heaved for a minute and then a trickle of black blood started from his lips. The convulsions started at almost the same time. Sam held his brother too him, unable to do anything else apart from let him ride it out until the shaking stopped and then he let Dean rest back on the bed.

"Dean?"

His brother flicked his eyes opened once and then closed them again. "It's starting again Sammy."

Ruby pushed him aside and forced Dean to drink a little of the mixture she had used on him before. He struggled to swallow it as the black blood started to trickle now from his nose as well.

Sam's phone rang and he wanted to just smash it off the wall. He opened it instead. Alastair's voice had a sinuous sound to it as it drifted down the line to him.

"She's wasting her time; I'm not going to let you give him a reprieve this time. This time I'm going to let you see exactly how bad this is for your brother. I'm going to leave him conscious for it…oh of course that means he may die this time but don't worry…it won't be an actual natural death and it'll only be for a little while. Wouldn't want to spoil the game too early. You wanted to know what it was really like for him…well watch and learn." The line dropped and Sam just stared at Ruby unable to speak for the moment.

"What did he want?" Dean's voice brought him back.

"It's going to get bad." Sam flicked his eyes over to his brother and the look in them made Dean tremble slightly.

Sam was a study in cold fury, his anger at Alastair evident in his whole demeanour.

"Do I want to know how bad?"

Sam shook his head, sat down and took his brother's hand. "Bad."

Dean sighed and felt them rising up inside him. He smiled weakly at his brother. "So, not going under this time eh?"

Sam shook his head again.

"Well then." Dean closed his eyes. "Bring it on."


	5. Chapter 5

**Author's Chapter Notes:**

Alastair finds a new way to torture Dean.

Hope you like.

PS One little bad swear word in this!

-

Black King rallies his Pawns

Sam tried not to look down at his brother's wrists as the welt started to show on his skin, but he couldn't help it. He knew what the marks were…they were tying his brother down, the physical marks appearing on his brother's body of the torture that was about to take place inside him or wherever they had his brother at the moment. Dean was lying with his eyes closed, breathing controlled if not exactly easy, and his demeanor calm. Sam took his hand and Dean registered the movement with a small squeeze but he didn't move and he didn't open his eyes. -

--

_This wasn't what he had expected at all. He was pushed down, held there until he was bound and then Alastair appeared. _

_"Wasn't expecting a personal visit. I thought that you were going to send in the good doctor?" _

_"Oh he's about. I've got a little surprise for you first. I think we should have a little trial for you before we pass sentence." Alastair lent down to him. "I'd hate to torture an innocent man." _

_"Didn't stop you with anyone before." _

_"Didn't stop you either Dean if I remember." _

_"Fuck you, just do what you're gonna do to me and get it over with…the mind games are boring…I know that this isn't the part you like so why don't we just skip to the good stuff and you can sit and get yourself off on watching the torture." _

_"I do love to hear you scream Dean but the mind games are the bit you hate, aren't they Dean? The physical pain you cope with, your used to it…god know you should be after what you've had done to you." Alastair drew the knife in his hand down Dean's chest and he tried his best not to let the bubble of fear in him break the surface. "It's the mental torture you can't handle well Dean…the guilt trips and I've got a peach of one for you." _

_"Oh yeah?" Dean watched as Alastair brought the blade up under his eye and couldn't help the little intake of breath as it brushed his eyelashes. _

_"Never liked the eyes did you Dean? Never liked them staring at you." Alastair lifted the knife free and turned away from him. "Did you ever wonder what the people you tortured did to end up down here Dean? Who they killed, what they stole, why they did what they did?" _

_He turned back to Dean and smiled. "I sent you the good ones Dean…I was saving this little revelation as the last thing to break you…make you one of us but now…now I think I'll let them tell you themselves." He patted Dean's arm. _

_"Before of course I let them carve you up, like you carved them up." _

_Dean watched as the woman walked towards him. She took the knife from Alastair and rested it across Dean's chest. "Do you remember me?" Dean watched as the blood started to run from the woman's eyes. "My name's Jenny. I was your first down here…do you remember what you did to me first?" _

_Dean swallowed hard and turned his head as she slid the knife up his cheek. "You took my eyes to stop me staring at you? Do you remember that?" _

_"I…I remember." _

_He felt the sweat break out on his skin as she slowly brushed his hair with her hand. He wanted to close his eyes away from the madness that danced in her own and he wondered briefly did he look like that when he had come to them. He knew he had…her eyes were empty and dead but they still glitter with delight and he knew that he would be shown no mercy by her, just has he had shown her none. _

_"I killed my husband." _

_She was lost in her thoughts, dragging the knife dangerously close to his eyes. "Do you know why?" The knife paused, pressed into the soft flesh, resting on his cheek bone. "He beat me, he put me down on the floor and he kicked and he punched me. Night after night until I couldn't take it anymore and I snapped. I took the knife from the block in the kitchen and I stabbed him with it…right through the heart…then I went and I cut myself." Dean watched as the slits appeared on her arms and wrists. "I couldn't live with him and I couldn't live without him…so you see I committed two sins Dean, murder and suicide. Does that make me evil? It was enough to send me here but did I really deserve what you did to me?" She drove the blade into his cheek, above the bone, tracing it's line across his face. "I'm not allowed to take your eyes Dean, not yet anyway, Alastair wants to see all that pain and that hurt, but I'll be back and when I am…my face will be the last thing you see." _

_He couldn't stop himself "I'm sorry." _

_She turned to him. "You will be!"_

_--- _

Sam lent forward and wiped the bloody tears from his brother's face, frowning as the long dark mark appear under his right eye. He knew that they were cutting him.

"I'm sorry." Dean's voice was barely a broken whisper.

"I'm here." It was all Sam could think of to say as he held his brother's hand a little tighter.

Dean's eyes flicked opened and he stared blankly upwards, no sign that he acknowledged his brother's presence, the movement of his chest and the warmth of his hand the only things keeping Sam from reliving the nightmare that had been the aftermath of New Harmony.

He watched as a small trickle of blood appeared on his brother's t-shirt and lifting it he saw the black line, deep inside but only just grazing the surface of Dean's skin as it snaked its way across his chest. He shut his eyes and held on tighter.

---

_"It's too late to be sorry Dean, much too late." _

_Another woman approached him. _

_"Hello Dean. I'm Carrie. Do you remember what you did to me?" She took the knife and slid it gently under his skin on his chest and sliced him. "You skinned me Dean, I was when you were just getting into your stride down here, when the thrill was pushing away the emptiness. I was your first real slice and dice. Tell me Dean…" She smiled at him serenely. "…was it good for you? I bet it was." _

_She brushed her hand across his chest and up to his head. He winced as she grabbed his hair and pulled it back. _

_"I robbed a store and I killed the clerk." _

_She smiled at him again, an edge of mania to it. "That sounds like I deserve to be here doesn't it? My family were hungry Dean. Do you know how that feels, to have no money, no food and have someone relying on you to make sure that they are fed? To watch that person look at you with trust in their eyes because you are the one that makes everything alright. Do you know how desperate that can make you?" _

_She smiled at the look in Dean's eyes. _

_"You've been there Dean haven't you. The choice between starving yourself or letting them go hungry sooner? I gave them it all, took nothing for me and then…then there was nothing left to give them and I had to do something because they depended on me. I didn't mean to kill him, I had a knife I meant to just scare him but he grabbed me and I panicked." _

_She pushed the blade into his chest and he felt the blood flow into his throat. _

_"I made the cops shoot me…my life was over anyway…they'd have taken them away from me and I couldn't live with that. I couldn't live with being alone. They were better off without me anyway…they put them somewhere where they were fed and clothed and loved. I did it for nothing. I was selfish to keep them with me…I should have cut them loose before and I wouldn't have been here and you wouldn't have hurt me." _

_She went to dig the blade in again but a hand stopped her. _

_"Now, now. We discussed this before Carrie…no killing the defendant before the trial is finished…even though we all know he's guilty and he knows what we're going to do to him." _

_Alastair took the knife from her and shoved her aside. "Can't get good staff these days Dean. Enjoying yourself? Isn't it fun finding out all about your new friends? I've got such great stories lined up for you Dean…you'll love how innocent these souls really are…especially compared to some down here." _

_"Please just stop this…just do it already." _

_"Tell me you can't take it anymore Dean. Tell me what it's doing to you." _

_"Would that make a difference?" Dean knew the answer to that already. _

_"No but I love hearing you beg Dean. Do you think that I can do that…make you beg for me to end it." _

_"Please…I didn't asked to be saved…it's not my fault." _

_"You said it Dean…my favourite line of all time. Do you know how often I hear that down here and how much I love it. Not my fault." Alastair grinned at him. "Well Dean I have to tell you what I tell everyone else…it's always your fault." _

_Dean screamed as Alastair sliced open the cut that Carrie had started in his chest. _

_"Feel better now Dean…I always find that a little pain helps with the focus."Alastair set down the knife. "Now where were we…oh I know…next!" _

_He lay there, listening to their stories…stories of desperate people with no other options left to them but the one that they had taken…each one of them doing what they thought was right without thought to the consequences for themselves…each one a little like him. He knew Alastair had picked them on purpose, to torment him, to break him more than he had been already and it was working, he could feel the shame and disgust that he felt about himself rise up and fill him. He wanted this to stop, needed it to stop…just like before…just like when he stepped down from the rack and stepped up to the mark. He couldn't let that happen again but he didn't know how to stop it…that was Alastair end plan, he was sure of it. _

_If he did that they'd take him down and he didn't think this time he get back out. He didn't think that this time he could be saved. _

_He didn't think this time he would want to be. _

_--- _

Dean's eyes fluttered open again and he let out a groan of pain and clutched his chest with his free hand. Sam looked down and hissed at the two black welts that covered Dean's chest.

Dean squeezed his hand and made him look up. "Make them stop please…I want them to stop."

"Who Dean…stop what?"

Dean eyes had a desperate look to them that broke his brother's heart. "Don't let me."

"Dean? Don't let you what?" Sam hovered over his brother's face watching and waiting for a reply.

"Don't let me fall again."

Sam looked at Ruby but she shrugged. "I don't know what he's talking about."

Sam resisted for now the urge to hug his brother to him. He placed a hand on Dean's cheek instead making him look at Sam again. "I won't, I've got you…this time…I've got you."

He felt panic grip him as Dean's grip on his hand loosened and his eyes fell shut. "Stay with me Dean, please…I know it's bad but please just hang on."

----

_"My name is John." _

_Dean blinked and there was a man standing before him._

_"I murdered my son." _

_Dean closed his eyes and tried to hide inside himself. _

_"Don't you want to know why?" The man's voice was closer, by his ear and Dean wanted to scream at him that he didn't care but he knew that wasn't true…he did care…he'd always cared… even once he'd lost himself in the role…even after he had taken pleasure from giving rather than receiving the daily ritual of pain and anguish that had been Hell…a little piece of him had still cared. _

_"He was dying." Dean opened his eyes again, knowing that it was useless to hide from a pain that was already inside him_, _eating at him. "He had leukaemia, he was terminal, weeks to live." _

_"Please…don't." Dean couldn't stop the plea escaping from his lips. _

_"Don't what? Don't tell you that you tortured me because I spared my son the agony of wasting away? He was five. I gave him too many pills and then I took the rest…he died in my arms. Peacefully in his sleep, the way it should always be." The man rested his hands on Dean's wrists and lent right over him, his mouth to Dean's ear. Dean felt him look up and then he lowered himself and spoke to him again. "I'd do it again." _

_"What?" Dean tried to turn his head but found he couldn't. _

_"Even knowing what I'd face down here, even knowing what you did to me and what you made me endure…I'd do it again…I'm not sorry. I loved my son and I did what I thought was right…even if it was a sin. I don't regret it. Would you?" _

_"I don't…?" _

_"Would you? Knowing what you know now, would you give your life for your brother again?" There was something in the man's voice that Dean couldn't quite make out…a softness to his tone that was alien in this place. _

_"You know what I did?" He felt the man nod gently next to his face. _

_"Would you?" _

_"Yes." Dean knew that he meant it, he had wondered over the question a few times in Hell and a few times after but he knew the answer all the same. If it came down to it he'd choose Sam over himself every time. _

_"Then I forgive you. You did what you had to do…we all did what we had to do and if that means an eternity of suffering then so be it. If it hadn't have been you it would have been someone else. It's not your fault. I'm not sorry." _

_The man pulled himself off Dean's chest and stared at him. "Don't you be." _

_--- _

Dean sat up so quickly that he almost fell off the bed.

Sam grabbed him and righted him. "Are you alright?"

Dean dropped his head to his brother's shoulder for a moment and collected himself. "Yeah…I think so."

"What happened?" Sam pulled him back. Dean had that haunted look in his eyes that he had when he woke up in the mornings but there was something else that had crept into them.

"I don't want to talk about it." He lay back down and fought down the urge to break into tears. All those people and he had done such horrible things to them and they hadn't deserved it…not really. John's voice filled his head again. _It's not your fault. I'm not sorry…don't you be._ The words filled his head and drove away his pain.

Sam looked at him. "What?"

"It's nothing." Dean dropped his eyes to his hands and then looked back up. "It's just…I think that I've got someone on my side…someone who doesn't blame me for what I did to them."

Sam suddenly realised that it was a little bit of hope that was shining in his brother's eyes. He didn't know where it came from but he rejoiced in the fact that it was there. "You already have that you idiot." Sam hugged him close and waited for his brother to push him off.

He didn't.

"Well now it looks like I've got two."

Sam sighed as his phone rang. "What now?"

Alastair's voice had a tone of displeasure to it which Sam found that he liked until he realised what it might mean for his brother. "I didn't give your brother permission to leave the party…that was very rude of him. I'm sorry to say that in his absence a jury of his peers found him guilty. Time for him to face his punishment."

Before Sam had a chance to take in what that meant Dean groaned and fell against him.

**Chapter End Notes:**

Thanks for reading and the reviews so far.


	6. Chapter 6

Hi folks. Just a little note to say thank you for all the lovely reviews. I will try and get personal replies done today, but I just wanted you all to know that I am appreciating the support!. Mary x

Knight Moves.

_He was ready for this, it wasn't like he didn't know what to expect – hell – been there got the t-shirt. _

_He watched as Carrie came to tie him back down, and he recognised the man with her. The doctor leaned over him with a smile and Dean couldn't stop the shiver at his touch. _

_"So tense…you need to relax more." The doctor took his arm and wrapped the black band tighter round it. "This is all in your head, in your soul, Dean but your body is going to feel every little thing that we do to it…just as if we were actually committing a physical act." He raised the syringe and gently shot a small amount of the liquid from the needle. "You're tied to us Dean and there's nowhere to go and no one to help, just like before…just like in hell." _

_"A little something to help you relax, Dean." He lay there as Ellicott pierced his skin with the needle and then watched as the others gathered round, their eyes bright with anticipation. He wished he could close his eyes here as he could in the real world but he knew that down here…in here…hiding from the pain was never an option. Ellicott smiled sweetly at him. "First the warm up act then I'll get down to business." _

_---_

_She stepped up beside him and lent down resting her head against his, arms folded for the moment on his chest. Bright blue eyes staring at his own bright green ones. "I won't ever forget your face Dean, and after this, you'll never forget mine. I've been waiting for this moment for a long time and I'm going to savour every minute." _

_She rested the tip of the blade on his chest and drew a thin bloody line up it. _

_"Can you feel that Dean, the slide of the blade on your skin? Are you afraid yet?" _

_She lifted the knife and then he could feel the edge of it dig into the soft skin inside his elbow. _

_"I bet you're wondering what I'm going to do to you aren't you? What I'll start with at least?" _

_She raised the knife were he could see it, the glisten from his own blood catching the light. _

_"I'm going to take this knife and do to you what you did to me…I'm going to slice every little piece of this beautiful, freckled skin from the flesh underneath…and I'm going to make you scream while I do it. Think you'll like that Dean? I know you did when you did it to me." _

_Dean smiled, a flat thin smile. "I don't remember talking as much thought…are you nervous? First time?" Dean's smile changed to a sure and steady grin. He pulled his head up towards her as far as he could. " It's easy, just stop talking already and get on with it…what is it with you people, are you trying to bore me to death first…save you the bother of carving me up? Maybe your scared to step up to the mark?" _

_She laughed softly, the sound close to his ear. "No Dean, nothing is going to deprive me of this, you wouldn't be let off that easy." She gently pressed her lips to his forehead as she dug down with the knife to break his skin. "I know what's coming, so why don't you just do it!" He flinched as he felt the blade slid down his arm to his wrist, opening it up and then slipping under his skin, slipping into his arm and then it was lifting, pealing back his outer layer and he felt the scream start to rise in him even as he tried to fight it back down. _

_---_

Sam watched in horror as the black line appeared on his brother's arm, watched as it slow worked its way down. Dean's arm twitched slightly and his brother let out a small cry. The black line became a stripe up his brother's arm and Sam looked up at Ruby.

"What's happening?"

Ruby wouldn't look him in the eye.

"Ruby?"

She walked round the other side of Dean and sat on the chair that was resting beside the bed. "It's starting."

Sam reached over and lifted her chin, forcing her to look at him. "What are they doing to him? Why is it worse than the last time?"

"I'm sorry Sam…wherever they've got his soul right now…they're…." Ruby stopped and touched the hand that was touching her face. "…they're…cutting him." She didn't voice what she knew, didn't think that Sam would cope very well with the fact that someone was skinning his brother, real or not.

"Can he…can he feel that?" Sam rubbed his hand along Dean's increasingly blackening arm. He watched as Dean bit his bottom lip and a long shuddering breath escaped him. "Why isn't it healing again like last time?"

"Yeah Sam…he can feel it…he's going to feel it all. Alastair does want it to heal this time Sam…not yet."

"I can't do this…I can't sit and watch this happening." Sam loosened his grip for a minute and then tightened it again as he realised that no matter how bad things got he couldn't just abandon Dean to his fate. Not again. He closed his eyes but held on tight to his brother's hand, smiling slightly as he felt Dean squeeze it back again.

---

_He'd forgotten quite what it was like. He didn't think he had but it wasn't the way he remembered it. He thinks maybe it because he is still awake in the this world, the real world that it has changed something. His whole body is screaming at him to get up…to run, to get away from the thing that's causing him pain. He can't though because it's inside, tearing him open, turning his insides settles for forcing his eyes opened and struggling up into the embrace of his brother._

Sam's grip on him and his voice gave Dean something to centre on as the pain tore through him. He clung onto his brother like a drowning man and that's maybe what he was…except the sea is red all around him.

---

_The pain, it has a way of filling you, consuming you… until it was all that you were. The pain of being laid bare for all to see…all your layers and walls gone. _

_That's what Hell was about…making you care and then making you not care…taking the layers and stripping them all away. _

_They stripped away your clothes, they stripped away your skin, they stripped away your flesh and then when it got to the point that your mind couldn't stand it any longer…they stripped that away too, until you were nothing,...until you felt nothing…and that…that was good…that was a release. _

_And then they brought you back and it began it all again._

---

Sam felt the tears trail his face as his brother's grip on his hand failed and he went limp in his arms. He tightened his own grip in defiance. "Dean? Don't….stay with us." Even though his mind knew that this was to be a brief goodbye…his heart and his body didn't and the former breaking caused the latter to crash.

He let the sobs escape him as he laid his brother's head down gently on his shoulder.

He sat that way for what seemed like an eternity listening to and feeling it as his brother's breath death rattled through his broken body and he wished that there was something that he could do… but all he could do, just like all those months ago, was nothing…nothing but watch and wait as his brother waited to die.

The voice was weak and tremulous when it spoke his name.

"Sam?"

Sam raised Dean's head and opened his eyes. Dean's own eyes were open, bloodshot and sore but still…they were open and Dean was still hanging on.

"Dean?"

His brother spoke again and Sam had to lean back into him to hear him. "Help me…please."

---

_His thoughts are drowned in a wash of pain, bright and sharp that made his nerves raw. The blade pushes under his skin and then into his flesh. It burns through him, inside, outside, until he's nothing, not a person at all. He is just torn flesh and ripped skin, and he tries to keep together the shattered pieces of his shredded soul. __He can't fight it or move from it and all that is left to do is to scream and then to die. _

_Dean lets the words slip from his lips that he repeated for over thirty years in Hell, his quiet plea for his brother's help. He wasn't sure what he wanted his brother's help with…to live…to die…he just wants this to be over. He needs this to be over. He is almost there, their hands were on him, tearing at him, ripping him apart and their voices filled his head…they taunted him, whispered to him of the things that were yet to come just as he had once whispered the same promises to them. He waits for them to finish him and he is going…feels the welcome numbness, the release building in him as his body shuts down. Then he feels the hands touch his head and he realises that the good doctor is back. He watches as the smiles, save one, around him brighten, whispers of why he deserves this filling his mind for one last time. He tries to focus on that one smile but then Ellicott leans over him and all conscious thought is gone, his release robbed from him as a bright pain shoots through his mind, this time ripping the scream from him again and again until finally…thankfully…the darkness comes and claims him for it's own. _

_--- _

It was silent in the room, Dean's screams had ebbed and finally ceased a few moments before and now his bruised and battered body was lying limp on the bed.

Sam stroked his hand through his brother's hair and his breath hitched again as Dean's grip loosened completely this time. "I'll save you this time Dean. I promise that…this time I won't let you down…more than that…I swear I won't. They can't take you this time Dean…I won't let them."

For the longest time the only noise in the room was the unsteady breath of the youngest Winchester and then the silence was finally broken by the bleep of Sam's phone.

---

Sam opened the phone and watched as the name and address appeared on the screen. He scrolled down to the message underneath that told him he had three hours to reach the next targets and get the job done. The last line chilled him.

_Your brother's body stays here, you can't take him with you. _

He knew that it meant leaving Dean here on his own, he needed Ruby to demon spot, and he wasn't sure that he could do that, but he knew that not to would turn his brother's temporary absence into a permanent one once again.

"Do we have to go?" He'd almost forgot Ruby was there. She had been sat there, quietly, watching, waiting for him to remember that even though Dean was gone for the moment she was still there.

He looked at her and nodded before turning back to his brother. "How am I supposed to leave him here on his own? What if Alastair doesn't bring him back…what if he takes him with him?"

"He'll be alright Sam…we can't do anything here all we can do is play along for now, if we're quick he might not be back before we are. The longer this takes Sam the longer he suffers."

Sam released his hold on Dean's hand and laid it gently across his brother's chest.

"Ready?" Ruby walked round and put a hand on Sam's shoulder.

He turned, wiped his face with his hand and sighed deeply. "I'm going to fix this, I'm gonna finish this game and then I'm going to finish Alastair." It wasn't a declaration of intend it was a cold hard statement of fact.

Ruby walked to the door and turned. "No you're not."

He walked over and looked down at her. "What?"

"Not you…we…we're going to finish Alastair…in this together remember?" He stared into her solemn eyes and just briefly Dean crept into his thoughts asking the question again…_just what does Ruby get from this?_

Sam pushed the thought away. "Yeah…ok…let's go."

He paused for one last look at his brother, still torn for a moment about leaving him here and then he took her hand and they walked over to the car, Ruby hesitated though before she got in.

"What is it?"

She looked round the car park and shook her head. "Nothing…just for a moment I thought that there was someone here."

Sam watched her intently. "Alastair?" He didn't feel him here but that he knew didn't mean he wasn't.

"No…something else." The feeling was gone and she shrugged it off. "Let get out of here…sooner we're gone sooner we're back." She climbed into the car at the same time as Sam.

She couldn't help a little look over her shoulder though as they pulled away.

---

_It was like that little itch that you couldn't quite reach to scratch, you know the one that's in the middle of your back or the sole of your foot when your driving and don't have anywhere to pull over to get to it. It was like that except it was inside and although it started as a small annoyance it quickly grew until you wished that you could reach inside yourself and scratch at it until there was nothing left. _

_Of course if you could have moved then you probably could have actually reached inside at that moment, because the skin was always the last piece to come back. It was always the piece that hurt the most. Another of Hell's little kinks – they fixed the inside so that you could feel the outside getting done…never miss any opportunity to raise the pain levels. _

_He could hear someone call his name, speak to him, and at first he thought that it was Sam but then he realised that he didn't know this voice. _

_---_

He slipped through the door and walked over to the prone figure on the bed.

"Dean?"

Robert Campbell lent over Dean and for a minute he thought that he was too late then he noticed the tell tale signs of healing on the skin of the prone figure in front of him. He breathed out slowly and knelt down beside Dean.

"You must have majorly pissed someone high up off to have this done to you but I guess that what this family does. We piss people off." He pulled over the chair and settled on it back to front, leaning on the back, waiting for Dean to show any signs of life.

"Let's see if we can't push that a little further then eh Dean? What do you say? You up for that?"


	7. Chapter 7

**Author's Chapter Notes:**

Hi Sorry for the delay, work and stupid PC have delayed this

Little note : Robert Campbell is mentioned in TKARA 3.02 as being Mary's uncle, a heart surgeon that died 19/07/2001, killed either by Azazel or for him, it does really clarify which. Sam is looking in the family history in the motel room. My character is a relation of his as I will explain in this chapter.

Thanks, Mary x

White outlines a plan of attack

Ruby had to almost sprint across the carpark as she struggled to keep up with the brutal pace that Sam set across it. Sam was already walking into the restaurant by the time she caught him and pulled his arm to stop him there in the doorway.

She got her breath back and flicked her head towards the far end of the diner. "The two guys in the end booth…that's them."

"Ok." Sam walked up the aisle and Ruby caught him up again and turned him to her, trying to make it look like an embrace and not as if she was restraining a madman, which she felt at the moment she was. Sam's anger shone from him.

"Wait, you not going to do it here are you?"

Sam almost laughed at the shock on her face as he peeled her fingers off him. "I am…I'm going to slip into the booth beside them, I'm gonna yank them out where they sit and then I'm going back to check on my brother."

He went to start down the aisle and she grabbed him again.

"You can't be serious!" She tried to keep her voice down and her face hidden aware that the demon facing them was now looking in their direction, the 6' 4" raging giant being restrained by the slip of a girl next to him catching the demon's attention.

There was a steely determination in Sam's voice when he spoke again. "Watch me. Alastair likes public displays…he's gonna get one. Keep the waitress busy."

Sam walked up and slipped into the booth.

"Morning, nice day isn't it?" His tone was affable and light, but he knew that his eyes were betraying the turmoil inside him.

"I think you've got the wrong booth there…_boy!_" The demon across from him lent over the table and into his face. "Now why don't you go, get your little lady there and get out."

Sam smiled a sweet, disarming smile. "Sorry, can't do…I need you to get out first I'm afraid."

He heard the clatter from behind him, took it as his signal from Ruby and raising his left hand in front of him, he grabbed the arm of the demon next to him with his right. Sam felt it this time, his gift. It was like a power surge and he was aware that the lights in the restaurant dipped briefly as he locked on to his two targets with more force that he could usually initially muster, his anger at Alastair feeding it. These demons weren't as strong he had feared, he realised that this was going to be easy. He focused all his anger at the men with him and did exactly what he'd told Ruby that he would. He yanked the demons out, the black smoke this time pouring from their lips and the men left behind slumping instantly over the table.

It was over in seconds and his head was buzzing from the effect. Sam took only a moment to gather himself and the reached out and touched both their necks, smiling as he felt their pulses under his fingertips. Quickly he extracted himself from the booth and pushed past a startled Ruby who was kneeling down, helping to clear up the tray she'd deliberately knocked from the waitress' hand. She stood up, a flustered look on her face and then, with one last look at the booth, she scrambled after Sam.

"What did you do?" She caught up with him at the car. She looked back at the window of the diner and watched as the waitress headed towards the two prone men. "Are they….?"

"Alive?" Sam finished the sentence for her. "Yeah, I exorcised them. I told you…I'm not in the mood to hang about here…Dean's gonna need me when he wakes up." He opened the car door and slid in waiting until she rounded it and got in too. "You were right by the way. Alastair is playing with both of us. Those demons were just foot soldiers, it was too easy. I think he wanted me to leave Dean alone. I think he wanted us out of the way."

"Why?"

"I don't know…but I have a bad feeling about this."

---

Dean struggled to open his eyes and focus on the face in front of him. He vaguely remembered the face that swan before him.

"Who….?" It was all he could force out. He felt the restraining hand against his chest.

"I'm the guy that helped you and your brother at the bar in Hell. Name's Robert."

Dean tried to force his body up off the bed but Robert held him there. "I wouldn't move just yet if I was you, I don't think your done healing yet." He reached into his jacket and pulled out a small flask. "Here, drink a little of this, it'll help with the pain."

Dean tried to turn his head away from the stranger but Robert gripped his face and held him there. "If I was trying to hurt you I could have done it before you woke up. I'm here to help. Trust me."

Dean studied the man. He felt that he was looking in a fairground mirror, the man reminded Dean of himself but he was leaner and although it was hard to tell from this angle, he looked taller. He found that for a reason that he couldn't explain that he did want to trust him. "Where's Sam?"

"Your brother left with his pet demon."

Dean raised an eyebrow.

"How did I know about that? I know a lot about your family Dean and I'll explain when Sam gets back, now, will you please drink this?" Dean hesitated for only a second and then let Robert pour the liquid into his mouth. It stung and he could feel it burning all the way down inside. "Shit." He shut his eyes and waited until the burn changed into a pleasant warmth that ran through his whole body. It seemed to quell the excited chatter of the others in his head too, holding them at bay, for how long him didn't know but he was grateful of the small reprieve. He finally found his voice again.

"What was that?" Dean screwed his face up at the bitter after taste in his mouth.

"Just a little family pick me up." Robert pulled Dean's arms straight and pushed his three-quarter length sleeves all the way up, turning and examining the arms as he did. "The marks are almost gone, you should feel a little better soon."

"Help me up." Dean held out his hand and Robert gently lifted him and slid him up against the pillows.

"Don't try to talk just now, just rest, like I said we can talk when your brother gets here." He walked over and got the bottle of water from his bag. "Here."

"Thanks." Dean struggled to open the top of bottle, finding that his hands and his muscles didn't seem to quite belong to him yet. Robert took the bottle and twisted it open.

"Can you manage from here?"

"Not sure." Dean closed his eyes and made fists with his hands trying to force the life back into them.

Robert lent over with the bottle and held it up to Dean's lips. "I won't tell if you don't."

Dean hesitated for a moment and then smiled at him, accepting his help.

"How's the pain?"

"Still there." Their conversation was interrupted as Dean turned his head to the door, the familiar rumble of the Impala's engine catching his attention as it drifted through the room. "He's back."

----

Sam burst through the room door, stopped, and then rushed towards the man sitting on the edge of the bed next to his brother. He caught Robert by the jacket and swung him round hard and into the wall. "What the hell are you doing here?!"

Robert tried to push him off but couldn't, Sam was like an angry bear. "If you've touched him…."

"I came to help." Robert tried to get the words out as Sam crushed him harder against the wall.

"Sam." Dean's voice pierced through Sam's red mist a little and for the first time he realised that Dean was awake and sitting up. "It's ok. Let him go."

"Not until he tells me who he is and why he's here."

"Sam!" Dean raised his voice and then started to cough, bringing up little bits of blood as he did. He dropped his head and inhaled sharply through his teeth as a little residual of pain followed the blood up his insides.

Sam dropped Robert and was instantly at his brother's side. "We should get you checked out."

Dean sat for a moment until he was sure that he could speak. "Nah, I'm fine."

"Yeah 'cos you look it." Sam's anger hadn't abated, it has just found a new target.

"I'm fine." He managed to make it sound a little stronger.

Sam sighed and turned back to Robert.

"Well? Talk. You've got five minutes."

----

"My name's Robert Campbell."

Robert was pacing back and forward at the end of the beds and Dean had to eventually stop following his path, the movement of his head making him feel queasy. Sam however was following every movement that the other man was making. Dean could see that Sam didn't trust him and Dean found himself wondering briefly again why he did.

Sam raised his eyebrows as he heard the name and Dean threw his brother a look. "Name mean something to you?" Dean had a little thought of his own niggling at the back of his brain but it was buried for the moment under thin layers of pain and the voices that still echoed round inside him.

Sam never took his eyes off Robert as he spoke, an edge to his voice that made Dean reached out and grip his wrist. "Our great uncle, mom's uncle….that was his name."

Robert smiled at him and ran his hand over his face in a gesture that Sam was more familiar with his brother making when he was nervous or stressed.

"Robert was my granddad. The demons killed him, he was in his seventies, there was no need for them to do that…apart from the fact that he was related to your mom. They took my dad too, the same year."

Sam had open hostility in his voice when he spoke. "Why didn't they come for you too then, and what about your mom? Azazel killed them all, all mom's relatives, her friends, hell he even killed her doctor…so why aren't you dead and why didn't I find a trace of you when I was looking through the family?"

Robert sighed. "Your aunt? Not my mother. She was a one night stand when dad was eighteen and your aunt and him were already married. We didn't live with him, he just came by to visit when he could."

"Oh…" Sam wanted to say something but he wasn't sure what.

"It's not a big deal, at least not now it isn't. Dad liked to get about a bit, in fact I'm probably not the only one that's out there, I'm just the only one that he found out about. I don't blame him though, I'm not exactly a saint myself."

"So you're family." Dean looked up at him from the bed. "Why now? Why did you wait 'til now to come to us."

"You called me."

Sam looked at Dean. "Another secret Dean?"

Dean bristled at the accusation, wishing he felt well enough to stand up, fed up with being looked down at. "I didn't! Don't scowl at me like that!"

Both brothers turned to stare at the elder man when he spoke. "I didn't mean call as in lift the phone, call…" He touched his head. "…I mean call, as in 'for god's sakes help me' call."

Dean looked at him. " Funny, don't remember doing that either."

Robert stopped pacing and connected with Dean's gaze. "You and I we have a link, a connection. I can feel what you feel. I can dream your dreams."

"That must be fun for you."

"Not so much. You don't remember me at all do you?"

"Should I?" Dean raised his eyebrows and shrugged at his brother's quizzical look.

"I'm a healer and an empath. Dad and I paid a visit to your Dad after the fire, it was Sam's first birthday."

Dean's memory gave a little kick, the soft voices, people whispering to him and about him. "I wasn't talking."

"John was worried."

"So you….you _healed_ me after the fire? Newsflash, you didn't do that good a job of it."

"I tried, I was only ten or eleven myself….but I tried. You were at least talking by the time we left."

"How did you find out that you could heal people?" Sam had watched the exchange quietly until now, but he had questions that he wanted answers too as well.

"My mother had the gifts. She showed me how to use them."

"So what…you're here to heal me now? How can you do that…it's not like I'm sick." Dean's voice had a sceptical tone in it.

"I'm an empath too remember and not just an ordinary one. I'm not here to heal you, this thing that Alastair is doing, if we stop it and get the souls out, then your body should heal itself. I'm going to get you to have a little talk with the souls locked inside you and then we'll see about getting them out."

Sam interrupted. "You can't get them out."

Robert smiled at him. "I know that I can't…but I think I may know a way you can."

**Chapter End Notes:**

Hope you like, and thanks for the reviews.

Mary xx


	8. Chapter 8

Hi there

Next little update for you, thanks again for the reviews people, I love them and I will update my replies after soon!

Robert reveals a little more to Sam and Sam gets a visitor.

Enjoy, Mary xx

Check

"So you're here just to help 'cos we're family." Sam was helping Robert bring some books and bottles in from the truck while Ruby kept watch over Dean.

Robert stopped rummaging in the truck and turning to lean against it he surveyed the youngest Winchester. "You're like your Dad you know that don't you?"

"What do you mean?" Sam heaved the books up into his arms and then walked over to lean on the edge of the truck beside him.

"He didn't trust anyone either. He always thought that it was better to go it alone than ask for help, even when that help turned up on his doorstep offering itself to him."

Sam bristled. "I accept help, I just need to know what the agenda is behind the help before I accept. All the help that usually comes our way has a price attached to it, and a steep one at that."

Robert turned his head to him and smiled. "Well mine doesn't, I'm just sorry that it's taken me this long to be in a position to help."

"Why is that, why if you and Dean have this 'connection' has it taken you 'til now to come find us?"

Robert dropped his eyes and rubbed the back of his neck with his hand. "Let's just say that I had demon issues and leave it at that. That and I promised your Dad a time ago that I'd leave you both be."

"Dad asked you to stay away?…That's not helping your case any. And what kinda demon issues?" Sam absently ran his free hand through his hair as he waited for an answer.

"Your Dad and I bumped into one another a coupla times on hunts that overlapped…"

"You're a hunter too?"

There was a surprised tone to Sam's voice that made Robert chuckle quietly. "You sound shocked? Did you look in this truck? Yeah I'm a hunter, it was mainly the only way I got to spend time with my old man so I took it, besides, it's the family business…you know what I mean, there really is no escaping from this life…unless its in a box."

Robert's voice had a bitter edge to it that tugged at Sam's own feelings.

Sam pulled the subject back. "So you were saying… Dad and demons."

Robert paused for a moment trying to find his place. "…yeah I met your Dad on a few hunts, ones that were too big for him, his friend…"

Sam interrupted. "Bobby?"

"Yeah Bobby…. and Dean to handle alone. Your Dad called in a few favours and I ended up helping finish a coupla jobs. There was one job though, Dean was there but we were working on separate things…. I can get my hands dirty when I want to but I prefer the research side of things. Killing isn't really my thing."

Sam smiled. "Yeah, I know how that is." His smiled faded. "Or at least…I used to."

Robert nodded in acknowledge and continued on. "Anyway, I was in the library going over some registrars when I felt it, I knew your brother was hurt and hurt bad right from the get go. I called John, I don't think he believed me but he checked anyhow….lucky he did….ghost had knocked Bobby out and spiked your brother on an old pipe…John got to him before he bled to death but it was touch and go for awhile. I stupidly thought that I could help. I visited Dean in the hospital, he wasn't more than twelve at the time, just a little boy, pale as a ghost. I was healing him when your Daddy walked in. I've never seen anyone so angry…called me a freak and told me to stay away from him and his family. He told me that I had the devil in me, that I was tainted. I never forgot that, I had only been trying to help…I mean what good is a gift if you can't help people with it?"

He looked at Sam expecting an answer but the younger Winchester just sat there, silently beside him, lost a little in his own thoughts.

"I blocked Dean after that and refused any hunts that I knew would bring me into contact with John. I didn't want to know if I wasn't gonna be allowed to help. I only felt Dean twice after that, there was one time, just a little over a year ago…the pain was so bad that nothing that I could do would block it out, yet I knew he wasn't hurt or dying, not physically anyway…it just felt like he was. I was on the point of getting into my car when it stopped, sudden as it had started. I guess you know when that was though, I didn't find out 'til later."

"That was when I died…when Dean sold his soul for me?"

"I prayed that I'd never feel anything like that again in my life, Dean's grief was crushing, worst damn thing ever…well until he went downstairs that was."

Sam's eyes lit with shock. "You could feel what was happening to him in Hell?"

Robert nodded, clearly not willing to elaborate on the remark and then he continued. "My demon trouble that I mentioned? Alastair. Seems he found out that Dean and I had a little link so he paid me a visit."

"Why?"

"He wanted to use me…he couldn't break Dean, he couldn't find the chink in his armour…apart from you that is, but even that wasn't working…not really. He couldn't get far enough inside to find that little bit of your brother that's his Achilles' heel, but he knew I could…'cos I had touched it before."

"What?"

"Dean still has that little four year old boy inside him. The one that still pines for his mom, that still misses her every minute of every day. The little child inside that still believes that there is good in this world, that you just have to know were to look for it. He's still in there…or at least he was. Alastair took the only piece of innocence that was left in Dean, and he ripped it out."

Robert placed the bottle he was holding back in the trunk and turned to Sam. "I'm sorry I wasn't as strong as your brother is. I held out for a long as I could and then I couldn't take anymore. I let him in….I let him in behind Dean's walls, the one place that your brother never lets anyone into, and Alastair damn near destroyed him with it. That's why I'm here…to right a wrong…put things right if I can."

Sam's anger bubbled again. "I think you might be too late. Dean's broken and I don't know how you think you can fix that, I don't think he even knows…I sure as hell don't. Why did you do it? Was it really that bad?" Sam knew that it would have been but he didn't care at this moment, he finally found someone that he could blame for what happened to his brother.

Someone other than himself.

Robert lifted his shirt and Sam had to look away at the scars that criss-crossed the other man's chest. "My back's the same. Alastair tortured me for four days, doesn't sound like much but believe me…it was. The only reason I'm still here is 'cos I'm a healer. He left me broken and bloody on the floor…I think he thought I was dead, I know I wished I was."

Robert dropped his shirt and picked the bottle back up. "I knew when they broke him….the pain didn't stop but at least he wasn't screaming in my head anymore."

Robert motioned Sam out the way and slammed the truck shut.

He stopped as he headed to the motel room door. "So now you know what my agenda is…I want to help Dean and bring Alastair to his knees." He tilted his head to the side and looked at Sam with a question in his eyes that he gave voice to. "So, what's Ruby's agenda Sam…did you even stop to ask _her_ why?"

He didn't wait for an answer just opened the door to the room and stepped inside.

Sam paused for just a moment and then he followed him through.

---

"We were about to send out a search party." Dean had lay back down on the bed and his skin had taken on a paler hue than it had had before. "What were you guys doing out there?"

Sam shrugged. "Just talking." He tilted his head at Dean, a little look crossing his face and then he turned to Ruby. "Did something happen?"

"No."

"Yes."

The two replies where almost in unison and Sam watched as his brother and Ruby scowled at each other. Ruby turned to him. "Yes."

"It wasn't anything." Dean looked as Ruby like he wished he could perform Sam's little trick himself.

Sam walked over and took a fistful of Dean's shirt in his hand. "Not anything eh? Yet you still have more blood on your shirt than before?"

"It was just a nosebleed. No big deal." Dean ducked his head as Sam examined the pale skin and strained expression on his brother's face.

"Is it starting again?" Sam tried to get Dean to look at him but he shrugged off his hand.

"No." He paused. "I don't know. It feels different. I feel like….I….I think they're waiting on something but I don't know what."

Sam turned to Robert. "So we finish this. What's this idea that you have and what do you need me to do?"

"You're gonna help me get inside your brother and then he and I, we're gonna have a little talk with his friends…see if we can't get them to see things our way for a change."

Sam raised his eyebrows and looked at Robert as if he was mad. "I'm gonna do what? How do I get you inside my brother?"

"Please." Dean interrupted with a trace of a little grin on his face. "Can you guys find another way of phrasing that 'cos you're creeping me out over here." Robert smiled and Dean turned to him. "So how does the hell does Sammy get you inside my head or my soul…or whatever the heck he needs to do."

Robert smiled again at the bewildered expressions before him. "I have a ritual that should work to get me in but if it doesn't you can do it for me. Did you think that the gift only worked one way? If you can get them out…you can get me in, trust me, this'll work."

Dean looked between them. "Well I suppose that one more at the party won't make a difference but it's getting kinda crowded in here, you know, and I'm really not that much of a sociable guy…this'll work, you're sure?"

Robert nodded as Sam spoke.

"I don't like it, what if Alastair does something to Dean if he catches on? I mean, I've only got four more to go and then Dean's home, free and clear."

Robert put a hand on his shoulder. "Sam, do you honestly trust Alastair to keep his word and let Dean go, Dean was the one that got away and Alastair has a reputation to up hold. What do you say Dean?"

Both men turned to look at Dean who was sitting with his head down again. They froze at the low chuckle that rose from his throat. He never raised his head as he spoke but Sam felt it as the presence in his brother made itself known and he instinctively reached for Ruby's knife in his belt.

"Now, you wouldn't use that on your brother Sam…would you?" Dean brushed at each of his arms as if removing imaginary dust then pulled at the soiled t-shirt that he was wearing. "Your brother has crappy taste in clothes but I do like the way he takes care of himself. It's been a while since I was in someone as fit and as young as this." Dean stood and walked down to end of the bed. Sam moved to put himself between what was clearly Alastair, and Robert.

"Let him go!"

Dean chuckled again. "Now why would I do that?" He looked round Sam to Robert. "Well, well, still with us I see…come to try and heal Dean? I think it maybe a little late for that."

He turned his attention back to Sam. "I've decided to change the rules." He walked over to the room window and cast a smile in Ruby's direction. "I don't want you to get rid of the other four demons, I'm going to give you a choice instead." He turned and leaned back again the glass. A small smile crossed his lips.

"Final play of the game Sam. You get to choose." He examined his nails. "Your brother really should take more care of his hands, such rough skin and his nails…." He looked up. "Tsk, tsk."

"I get to choose what?" Sam swallowed nervously at the delight that shone in his brother's eyes.

"Oh sorry…where was I? Yes a choice. One can live and one…can get sent back to Hell. Dean or Ruby? Your brother or your bitch. Which one would you like to exorcise Sam?"

"I won't do it." Sam's voice was low.

"Sorry Sammy." Sam cringed at the way Alastair made his brother say that. "That wasn't one of the choices….you've got to midnight….appropriate don't you think? If you haven't decided by then…I'll just have to take them both."

Sam watched as Dean slumped to his knees. He started towards him but stopped as his brother's head came up.

"One other thing, Dr Ellicott didn't think I gave him enough time with your brother…seems he missed out on a little electro-shock fun….so every half hour I'm going to let him loose, see how much Dean can stand before it drives him crazy or kills him. Oh, and this time…if he dies…I'm not bringing him back so if it looks like he's fading you might want to do that exorcism a little sooner than the deadline."

Dean slumped all the way forward this time and the black smoke swirled the room once, pausing over Ruby, before exiting it. Sam hurried over and knelt down beside his brother. Dean had passed out, his heart and his pulse still racing from the possession. Sam was aware of the figure beside him and then Robert and he were helping Dean back onto the bed. Sam stood and turned to Ruby.

"It was you he wanted all along wasn't it, all this…." …he swept his hand towards his brother… "…and it was you that he wanted."

Ruby glanced towards Dean and then back at Sam.

"No Sam it's not, but I'm sorry Sam, I'm not letting you send me back there…I'm just not."

**Chapter End Notes:**

Well thanks again for reading and if you have reviewing. Take care, I will try to update soon.

Mary xx


	9. Chapter 9

Thanks again folks for the reviews. I'm hitting and running at the moment but I just wanted to let you know that the reviews are awesome and I appreciate them. Hopefully I will get the time to review them individually soon.

Robert reveals his plan.

White Takes The Black Pawns

"How do you think you can stop me?" Sam tilted his head and stared as Ruby moved round him, a subtle shift nearer the door.

"I can stop you, I taught you your little trick remember? What makes you think I showed you it all?" She smiled at him, a sweet, loving smile and then she laughed bitterly. "You can't exorcise me, just like you can't exorcise Alastair or Lillith…you don't know how. I didn't show you how."

Sam stepped forward as she stepped back. "Well then, if you can show me that, we don't have a problem…show me and I'll get rid of Alastair once and for all."

Ruby's laugh heightened. "You can't get rid of Alastair, he has a free pass…a get out of jail free card. He runs the damned place or has that escaped your notice? Lillith and the others, it's too much trouble for them, marshalling the troops, torturing the souls… but him…he loves it, it's a power trip. You send him back to hell and he'll just get to ride the express elevator back out."

"So how do we beat him then, there has to be a way?" Ruby tried to back away from Sam but he gripped her tightly and pulled her to him.

"You don't. Demons like Alastair can't be beaten, you just have to give him what he wants and hope that he'll go away. You're not giving him me though, that's for damned sure." She tried to struggle out his grasp, her voice edged with anger. "Let me go or I'm out of here. You can keep the body I'll find another one."

"Let her go."

Sam turned at the sound of his brother's voice.

"What?"

"I said let her go. She's right…you can't beat Alastair. It pointless to try." Dean had managed somehow to pull himself up against the headboard of the bed but was lying with his eyes only half opened.

"For once Sam, listen to your brother, he knows what he's talking about." Ruby managed to extract her arm from his grip and step away again.

Sam looked at Dean like he'd gone mad. "If I let her go, the means he takes you, that isn't gonna happen. We're gonna fight this Dean, at least try Robert's plan." He held up his hand and stopped Ruby as she moved again closer to the door. "I might not be able to exorcise you but I can hold you here until he comes for you…you either help me or I'll feed you to the wolf." He stepped closer to her and his voice softened as he spoke. "Don't make me do that."

Robert walked up to them and grabbed Ruby's arm, pulling her sleeve up. He had cut the mark into her arm before she had time to react.

"What did you do?" She pulled her arm from him and stared at the mark he'd made before looking up at him, her eyes black. "You didn't?"

"I did." He turned to Sam. "You can let her go, it's a binding link. She can't leave the body until she breaks it." He reached forward and pulled her sleeve back down. "If she breaks it…I'll exorcise her back to hell myself, the old fashioned way." He walked over and sat down next to Dean. "Look at me."

Dean reluctantly let his eyes flicker fully open again. "What?"

"You up for this? I can get them out but I need you to want me to."

Dean sighed and then nodded. "What do I have to do?"

Robert smiled at him. "Let me in and I'll show you."

He stood and sorted through the bottles that Sam and he had brought in and poured a little concoction from them, then walked over and sat down next to Dean.

"Please tell me I don't have to drink that?"

Robert chuckled. "No. This is for me." He reached into his pocket and pulled out the small knife that he'd cut Ruby with. "I need to add a little of your blood to the mix though."

Dean rolled his eyes. "Gross, you're gonna drink my blood? Do I need to check your teeth?" He laughed at Robert and then closed his eyes and grimaced. "What's wrong?" Robert lent in and took his hand.

"He's here." Dean took his free hand and rubbed the heel of his palm into his forehead.

Sam pulled Ruby over the beside his brother. "Ellicott?"

Dean could only nod again.

Sam turned to Robert. "Can you still do this even while Ellicott's on the loose inside him?"

"I think so, I'm going to try anyway, anything I do won't make it worse for him, not just now anyway." Robert gentle drew the knife alone the palm of Dean's hand causing a small cut and then he let a few drops of blood drip into the cup. "If it works I may need your help to send them packing….be ready."

"I still don't understand how you're going to free Dean from them. Alastair said that it couldn't be done." Sam sat down beside Dean, watching as his brother began to wrestle with whatever Ellicott was doing to him.

"We can make them want to let go, kill their hate for him and they should want to leave him. If we can do that we can end this." Robert gripped Dean's hand and lent forward, speaking close to his head and gently rubbing his thumb over the back of his hand. Sam watched as his brother relaxed with the touch although his face was still lined with pain.

"What if they don't?"

"That's were you come in. If Dean and I can loosen their grip then you will be able to free him. Once that's done, I've a little trick that'll keep Alastair off him."

Ruby snorted. "Good luck with that."

Sam watched as Robert stood, moved the bedside table and slid the beds together. He knelt on the bed and spoke to Dean. "Can you hear me? It's time. Let's do this."

Dean didn't response.

Robert closed his eyes, spoke quietly in Latin and then downed the mixture that he'd created.

Sam thought of the question as Robert lay down and gripped Dean's hand. "Have you done this before?"

Robert stared at him and then looked back at Dean. "Something like it…once."

"What happened?" Sam could feel the change in the room and wasn't sure if it was the question that had caused the tension or the fact that Dean breath was hitching through him on the bed he lay on.

Robert's voice was quiet when he spoke. "I lost him." Sam couldn't help noticing that he tightened his grip on Dean as he spoke. "It's not happening again."

With that he closed his eyes.

---

Robert was lost for a moment, it was like waking up and finding the nightmare that you'd tried to escape from was real. This felt real although Robert knew that it wasn't, he forced his way fully conscious and look for Dean. He could hear them around him, his presence had upset them, they weren't sure who or what he was and he didn't intend to tell them. Fear would make them easier to manipulate. He walked forward and saw him. Dean was lying up against the wall, eyes wide, chest heaving. Robert went over and knelt beside him, heartened when Dean turned to him and smiled in recognition. Robert brushed his hands over the finger marks in Dean's hairline.

"He's gone…for now." Dean's voice was barely a whisper.

"You holding up?" Robert checked Dean over for other signs of torture but there were none, only the finger marks.

"No." It was a strained admission.

Robert placed his hands over the marks and closed his eyes, concentrating on taking some of the hurt from the man in front of him. He only pulled away when the others spoke, opening his eyes and noting with satisfaction that the marks had faded under his touch.

"Why are you here?"

Robert turned to see them standing behind them, one man closer than the rest. This man was different than the others, he wasn't angry, more resigned to his fate. This man wasn't sorry for what he'd done and Robert realised then what Alastair had done to Dean. He realised that the ones he'd given Dean to torture hadn't done their evil deeds out of badness or for pleasure…they had done them from necessity. He felt a pang of sorrow for them and then he smiled….these people weren't truly evil, that would make this easier. "I'm here to get you to let him go, to stop Alastair using you to punish him."

The woman behind the man moved forward. "Why? He deserves to be punished. He punished us."

"No he didn't. Alastair punished you, he just used Dean to do it."

"And he let him…now…it's his turn again." She walked forward to Robert. "We're taking him back with us, Alastair said we could, Alastair said that he would be ours to play with as we see fit." She knelt in front of them. "I want to play." She reached out to Dean and touched his face. "He wants this too. He needs to pay for what he did to us…don't you Dean."

Dean moaned slightly under her touch and Robert resisted the urge to pull her hand away.

Her next statement was one of fact, Robert knew because he'd felt it himself. It was part of why he come in the first place. "It's destroying him. The guilt…it's eating him alive."

Robert did pull her hand away from Dean's face. "He's nothing to feel guilty for."

The woman laughed. "Really? I did what I had to do for my family and he tortured me for it. I didn't deserve to end up here. None of us deserved to end up here…with him."

The man standing with her lent forward and pulled her up to her feet and away from the two crouched figures. "Leave him alone. He did what he had to do. He was here for his family too."

She looked at him. "What? He was a hunter…he's here beside he killed things."

The man went to say something but Robert spoke first. "He's here because he sold his soul for his brother." Robert turned and looked at Dean almost willing him to stand up for himself but he didn't so Robert spoke for him again. "He doesn't deserve to be here either."

Robert turned to the souls that were starting to gather round them. "How long were you down there? How long did you suffer?"

There were a few murmured numbers, the highest was ten years…and that was John, the man that was speaking for them.

Robert turned to Dean. "Tell them how long you were here?" Dean looked up at him with uncertainty in his eyes. Robert pushed him. "Tell them!"

"Forty years."

Robert turned back to little gathered crowd. "How many times did Alastair ask you if you'd like to change side, if you'd like to be the torturer? How many times did he ask you before you agreed to torture Dean before you said yes?"

He watched as they looked to one another. It was John that spoke again. "He never asked until Dean."

The woman looked up. "I said yes the first time he asked."

"Dean, how many times did he ask you?"

"Every day."

Robert felt the ripple that ran through them all and he let Dean feel it too.

"And how many times did you say no? How long did you hold out?"

"Thirty years."

The ripple grew louder.

"Why did you finally agree Dean? Why did you finally do what he want you to?"

Dean lowered his head. "I can't."

Robert raised his voice. "Tell me!"

"I couldn't take it anymore. The pain, the taunts. I was desperate…I just couldn't…not anymore." Dean looked at the group in front of him but Robert didn't think he could really see them, Dean was remembering something else. "Every day, for hours he'd taunt me with it, let me feel the relief of the torture stopping while he pitched his sale and it made it worse…the little gap in the pain….made it so much worse to bare when it started again. He made the gaps longer until I needed them, craved them…and then he took them away completely." He finally seemed to switch back to the present, his voice breaking as he spoke. "I'm sorry. I just couldn't do it anymore after that."

Robert knelt beside him. "Hey, it's ok." He felt someone beside him. It was John.

"What do we have to do?"

"You can go or I can send you back…well I have someone that can, I just need you not to fight it." Robert looked up at John. "Can you do that?"

Dean reached up and grabbed the man's wrist before he answered. He looked at Robert. "You can't do this…he'll make it worse for them. He'll punish them because they let me go."

John peeled Dean's fingers from his wrist. "It can't get worse than it already is. It's Hell Dean, remember?" He laughed softly and stood.

---

Sam felt the presence before the door opened.

He turned and tried to fend Alastair off as he strode through the room. Ruby tried to pull free from his grasp put Alastair was on them before she could. Alastair gripped her shoulder and touched her head. Sam cried out as she dropped like a stone.

"I'll get to her later."

He turned to Sam.

"I think your brother and your friend here aren't playing the game within the rules, so that means that they'll have to forfeit." He gripped Sam's arm tight and touched his head. "You're coming with me…I've got something that I've been dying to show you…something I just know that your brother hasn't shared with you."

Alastair's smile was the last thing Sam remembered as he slipped away. That and the voice.

"You're going to love this!"


	10. Chapter 10

**Author's Chapter Notes:**

Hi

Thanks for the reviews folks, I'm glad that you are enjoying this little strange tale. and I apologise profusely for the lack of responses but there have been so many school hols and birthdays lately that I'm hardly at the PC.

Sorry about the cliffie, to make it up to you...I've let evil muse loose!! *smiles apologetically* :)

Ruby is playing good cop, bad cop here all by herself!! Don't you wonder which one she'll end up??

Hope you enjoy this. Mary x

Black King and Black Queen Attack

Robert moved closer to Dean as he felt the hunter tense beside him.

"What's wrong?"

"He's here, Ellicott and something else…Alastair's close by." Dean turned to Robert with the panic showing in his eyes. "He's done something….changed things somehow." Dean stopped talking and let his head drop to his chest. He let out a small half-cry and Robert watched in horror as the fingers marks that he'd helped heal only minutes before started to appear again.

"Why can't I see Ellicott?" He lifted Dean's head and closed his own hand over the marks again, felt the pain spike though his own body.

"Don't….know." Dean could hear the doctor's chuckle next to his ear, feel the fingers digging into his scalp. The pain jolted through him and he bit back the cry.

"Enjoying that Dean?"

Both men looked up at the sound of Alastair's voice and Robert watched as the others slid away for the moment, back into the shadows, hiding from Hell's chief torturer.

It was Robert that saw the form slumped at Alastair's feet first. "Sam?" He wanted to check on the younger Winchester but knew that he was the only thing keeping Dean's pain at an almost tolerable level. If he let go he might loose Dean completely. As it was he felt Dean stir beside him at the mention of his brother's name.

"What did you do to him?" Dean's voice sounded broken. "If you've touched my brother, I'll kill you myself." There was menace in Dean's tone but there was no force behind the words as he struggled to fight the attentions of the good doctor.

Alastair laughed. "You can't even stand Dean, besides it would be a lot easier for me to kill both of you at the moment…I mean the gang's all here so who's minding the bodies back in the motel?" He paused for a moment. "Oh, must be Ruby. Do you think if I gave her a choice between her skin and yours that she fall on the sword? She's my ace in the hole, so unpredictable…you gotta love her."

Dean snorted. "Not really."

"Oh I forgot, you and Ruby…you two don't play well together." He kicked Sam and smiled at the groan it elicited. "Don't like sharing your toy." He knelt down and pulled Sam up into a sitting position. "Wakey, wakey, Sammy boy…welcome to your brother's nightmare."

Sam put a hand down to support himself, pushed up and looked round, trying to get a grip on were he was and what was happening. He looked across and saw Robert and Dean sitting a few feet away. He tried to move towards them but Alastair stopped him and turned to Robert.

"Now if I'm not mistaken you had a little trick you were going to use Sam for. You keep Dean here while Sammy exorcises his little playmates back to hell." Alastair turned to the group and they stepped forward as if he'd called them. "Let's see how that works."

Alastair sat on a chair that until a few minutes before hadn't been there and folded his arms. "Oh I forgot." He raised his hand and flicked it at Dean causing him to groan again. Robert watched as the finger marks on Dean's head faded again. "The good doctor's on a break, but he'll be back and if you haven't finished your little show by them I may just let him finish Dean."

Alastair clapped his hands. "Let the games commence."

Robert let go of Dean and stood, carefully walking over to Sam and then dragging him back over beside him. Dean turned to his brother, eyes full of concern. "You ok? Did he hurt you?"

"I'm fine. You look like shit by the way." The manner that the line was thrown at him made Dean half smile, reassured slightly that his brother was unharmed…for now at least.

Robert stood and addressed the others, trying to ignore Alastair and the bored expression on his face. "Who's first?"

There was a moments hesitation and then Carrie stepped forward. "I'll go first."

Robert acknowledged her and faced Sam. "I'll need you to hold onto her while I break Dean away. Whatever you do, don't push until I'm ready or we'll all end up downstairs." He sat down between the brothers and took Dean's hand.

"Sam, give me your hand." Sam obliged. "Can you split Dean from the crowd, just a little and then link him and I together."

"I'll try." Sam sighed, squeezed Robert's hand and sought out his brother in the jumble in his head. He was aware of Robert's presence the whole time as he latched onto his brother and led him to the other man. Robert felt like a weight holding his brother down in Sam's head and Sam supposed that's what he was. Dean's anchor for the moment.

Once he was sure that Robert had a grip on Dean he let both of them go and turned to Carrie.

"What do I do?" She stepped forward, again, closing the gap.

"Just relax, and don't fight me."

She nodded and Sam raised his hand in the air and tenuously caught her. "Tell me when." He spoke to Robert.

Robert focused on Dean, mentally pulling him closer to him. "Now."

Sam pushed and Robert felt the tug as Carrie involuntarily struggled against the pull.

Sam opened his eyes and saw the figure in front of him fade and then form again. "Don't fight me…please."

Fear flashed briefly in Carrie's eyes and then she relaxed completely and Sam had her. There was a small flash of light and she was gone.

Sam had been expecting smoke but then he realised that none of these bodies were actually bodies; he was exorcising these people from Dean's mind, from his soul, not from a corporeal form.

Alastair clapped his hands in glee. "That was awesome." Somehow his brother's favourite word didn't sound right spoken in the smug tones. "A little waver but you did not drop the ball Sam. I'm impressed."

Robert squeezed Sam's hand and brought his attention back to him. "Keep it moving."

Sam nodded. "Who's next?"

One by one they stepped up and one by one Sam sent them back until there were only two remaining. Alastair stopped John as he stepped forward for his turn.

"You'll need to wait. I think the other should go first don't you? I mean I have a guest star in the wings to meet you all and I've kept it waiting. Where are my manners?" Alastair stood and walked over to Sam. "How much do you love your brother?"

"What?" Sam couldn't keep the confused look off his face, the change of subject flooring him for a second.

"It's an easy question Sam. I mean was there ever anyone on this earth that you cared more for than him?"

Robert felt Dean tense beside him and a little spike of fear shot through him.

Dean's fear.

"I don't know what you mean. He's my brother, I love him more than anything."

"Re..ally?" Alastair pulled the word out. "Well I've got someone for you to exorcise back to Hell that's attached to your brother, someone that he tortured down there more than once." Alastair knelt down. "In fact, I loved watching him with this one…it gave me chills."

"Don't." Dean voice was barely audible.

Alastair turned to Dean with the meanest smile that Sam though he had even seen. "Don't what Dean?" He crawled over Robert and put his face so close to Dean's that they were almost touching.

Dean turned away slightly. "Don't do this."

"I take it you know who our guest is. That's kinda spoiled my fun Dean." He sat back on his heels and spoke back to Sam. "You know what a witness is Sam don't you?"

Dean caught his sleeve. "Please." He lowered his head. "I go back, anything…just don't do this."

"I know what a witness is." Sam drew Alastair's attention back to him. "We did a spell, sent them all back to where they came from."

Alastair's smile almost split his face. "Not all of them…Lillith gave me one, long before she did the spell to raise the others, she let me keep it…as a pet. I let your brother torture it. It's here, now, waiting for you to send it back, to free your brother."

"Don't." Dean's voice had a desperate edge to it.

Robert felt him slip a little from his grasp, almost as if he wanted to go. "Dean, stay with me." He closed his eyes and concentrated on Dean's presence trying to block out the feelings that were invading him from the elder brother.

The figure moved in front of them, it's head cloaked. Dean groaned out a no and Alastair laughed. "A witness is someone that died a supernatural death. Someone that went before their time." Alastair moved closer to Sam. "Are you ready to send this one back to Hell Sam? Are you ready to save your brother?"

Sam frowned. "Are you changing the rules again?"

Alastair waved his hand in the air. "A little side game, before you choose between Dean and Ruby."

Sam sighed and nodded, reaching out to catch the soul that wavered in front of him only to pause at the feeling of familiarity that washed over him. He knew this person…or at least he had know it. He cast a glance at Dean but his brother couldn't look at him. That alone made the fear crawl into Sam's bones.

Alastair lent back into Dean. "How much do you hate me right now? I can feel it. It's intoxicating. Your brother's going to hate you for what you did as much as you hate me for showing him. How does that make you feel?"

Robert pushed the demon away, worry filling him as his hold on Dean slipped again. "Sam, careful."

Sam stood and walked towards the figure, listening as his brother quietly pleaded for him not to look and then pleaded for him to forgive him. Sam still had the soul locked in his mind, had it teetering on the edge of this place and the pit. He stopped in front of it and turned back to Dean again. "Who is it? Do you want to tell me or do I have to look?"

Dean looked up and caught Sam's eye, pain and shame filling Dean's own. "Don't."

Dean turned to Robert. "Stop this…take him back. I'll stay, just take him back."

Robert turned to him and asked the question even as Sam lifted back the hood and cried out. "Who is it?"

The brother's spoke in unison.

"Jessica."

----

Ruby struggled back through the haze in her head. She crawled over to the bed and leant against it, slowly turning her head to take in the motel room. Alastair was gone, Sam was lying still on the floor at her feet. Dean and Robert were unconscious on the beds. This was her chance.

She pushed herself to her feet and stared at Dean. She knew that all it would take to save herself was to finish him. Alastair didn't want her dead or in Hell, she was useful. She had Sam's ear, when she spoke, he listened. A demon with a hold on the only living person that could destroy her kind. She had power of her own because of it. They weren't afraid of her but they weren't knocking down doors to try and kill her anymore either.

She liked that. She wanted to keep that.

The duffle was lying on the table and she walked over and rummaged through it, pulling out Dean's gun and his hunting knife. She slide the sheath off of the knife and slowly ran her fingers along the edge of the blade.

She turned to the bed, walked over beside Dean and sat down next to him. "Without you there's nothing to stop me…you know that. Sam was lost without you and I picked up the pieces…I saved him." She stroked the knife blade down Dean's arm. "I think I deserve a reward for that at least. I mean without me…you would have could back to nothing but a body. Sam's mine now, and it's going to stay that way."

Standing, she turned the knife over in her hand. "I'm not going back Dean, I going to finish this and Sam's going to help me. I helped him get over loosing you once….I can help him again."

She raised the knife.


	11. Chapter 11

**Author's Chapter Notes:**

Hello, next update, hope you like.

Ruby shows her true colours – or does she? Sam makes a choice...but is it the right one?

Ok you are going to hate me more than some people hate Ruby for this chapter, I do very, very bad things in it! I will fix things though, promise! *evil laugh*

Queen - Black or White?

Ruby stilled for a moment and turned and looked again at the form that was slumped on the floor, the knife still raised, poised above his brother. Sam stirred slightly in his imposed coma and a little flash of image assaulted her of him lying broken in similar position in a similar motel room. The only thing that was missing now, was the bottle that had been an ever present then. She felt the knife waver in her hand as she looked between them.

"Shit!" She thrust the knife sideways, imbedding it in the wall just above Dean's head. "Damn it to Hell. You Winchester's will be the death of me. Again." She snorted and lent down over Dean, fisting his shirt in her hands and pulling the limp form up to her. "Damn you to Hell. Why did you have to come back?" She looked back over to Sam and then returned her glaze to the elder Winchester. "It's a good job that I love him more than I hate you, but this isn't a reprieve, think of it more as a stay of execution. I haven't survived this long by being nice."

Dropping Dean back on the bed she walked over and knelt beside Sam. "How did I let you get so far in…you weren't meant to get that far in." She checked through Sam's pockets and pulled out his phone, flicking it open and dialing from the recent calls list. She sat back against the bottom of the bed and drummed her fingers on the floor impatiently as she waited for the call to connect. The voice that greeted her from the other end was gruff.

"It's not Sam, it's Ruby….never mind that….your boys are in trouble, we all are….I need you to text me the ritual you used." She waited until the cursing had stopped from the other end. "I don't care what you think of me if you don't do this you'll lose them both this time…is that what you want?" Ruby almost smiled at the ill grace with which the elder hunter caved. _It always comes down to love against trust doesn't it?_ She explained what she needed.

Ruby lent back with a sigh as she finished the call and looked down at Sam.

She stroked Sam's hair gently. "We are all so screwed. Alastair's going to take us all down just for the sheer hell of it and I should leave…I really should."

She smiled as Sam's phone beeped and she read the summoning ritual and what she would need to work it. "This time Mr. High and Mighty, I not going to let you say no, not it you want to keep your golden boy here. She turned and slapped Dean's foot and then let her head fall back and rest on the end of the bed behind her, closing her eyes as she did. "How did I end up so screwed that only an angel can help me?"

----

Sam pulled his hand back as if the figure in front of him had burned him. He found he couldn't move, he just stared at the face in front of him trying to get his head round what Alastair had just thrown at him. _Jessica was in Hell…and Dean had tortured her._

"I fixed her face for you wasn't that nice of me? I left the rest though, thought you'd like to see first hand what Dean had done to her."

Alastair's voice cut through the haze and Sam finally got his body to response to his commands and moved forward, gently brushing her hair back off of her face.

"Jessica?" He couldn't believe it. He couldn't believe that the face that still haunted his dreams was right there, her skin on her face soft under his touch. She opened her eyes and he dropped his hand again at the blank, empty stare of the eyes that looked at him. He realised that 'his' Jessica was gone from the soul that he could still feel held in his embrace, just as she was gone from the conjured form in front of him. Hell had ripped her from it, left this echo of her in its place…Hell and his brother.

Sam turned to find Dean behind him, Robert supporting him. He felt the anger built inside him and he tried not to unleash it all on his brother. "How could you? It was Jessica, you knew what she means to me." Sam stepped forward and put his hand under his brother's chin, lifting his head up to make him look him in the eye.

Dean's walls were down for just for the moment that it took for them to lock eyes and Sam got a brief glimpse at the real torment that was raging inside his brother before he regained a little control and threw them up again. "Please…don't hate me, let me go but don't hate me." Dean closed his eyes and waited for his brother's anger to send him back to where he felt he deserved to be.

It didn't come which scared him more.

"I don't hate you….I could never hate you." The anger was still bubbling inside Sam but he kept it from his brother. "I just don't like you very much at the moment…that's all."

He let his hand drop and his brother's head fell forward.

Robert tightened his grip as he felt Dean weaken. "It's not his fault…you can't blame him for this."

Sam turned back to Jessica and John stepped forward. "Unless you've been there you can't imagine what it's like, what they do to you…you'd give anything, do anything to make it stop."

Sam looked at him. "I know…I think my brother has proved that." He stepped forward and gripped Jessica lightly, pulling her into his arms and sighing as he did. The smell of her perfume…the one that he'd bought for her filled his head and he felt the tears come. Alastair stepped forward, so close he was almost touching them. "She can't say goodbye Sam or I love you, Dean didn't like it when she screamed, although he could never quite manage to take her eyes…not like he did with the others."

Sam turned to him with cold, expressionless eyes. "You did this, not my brother." Sam channeled his anger at Alastair and almost smiled as the demon took a small step back before recovering.

Alastair's smile was cruel when he looked at him. "No, Sam actually you did this. Demon killed Jessica because of you, and then you got yourself killed so Dean had to sell his soul for you…and then you couldn't save him and so he ended up downstairs…with her. She's a witness but she's in Hell, because of you. Dean and her both ended up in Hell for one reason and one reason only. They loved you. It all leads back to you Sam, all the people that you love…they all suffer and burn because of you." He smiled again as Sam recoiled from the words he spoke.

"That's not true." Dean brought their attention back to him. "We all suffered because mom made a deal to save dad. Sam's a victim of that as much as, if not more than, the rest of us. Don't you lay this at his feet. It's not his fault. He didn't ask for the demon blood, he didn't ask for me to do what I did. So why don't you just finish the game and let my brother go…if it's me that you want, just take me."

"Now, now Dean, always so ready to jump into the fire for your family. Where's the fun in that for me? A willing victim spoils the game for me, it just won't do. Do you know how much fun we had watching the torment that your brother was going through because he couldn't save you from Hell? No? It was exquisite. Think then how much worse that'll be if he picks you to go there instead of the bitch?" He turned to Sam. "You know that you've got to pick your brother right? Without Ruby you can't defeat Lillith and that's all you really care about now isn't it?" He turned back to Dean. "You can want to go that's fine with me, but don't hide behind the martyr's cloth Dean. You want to go back because you liked it there. You finally found something you were good at, somewhere you felt you belonged. Didn't you?"

"That's not true."

"No? You didn't love finally having someone tell you that you were good at what you did? You didn't love the praise, the admiration that I had for your work? You didn't love how much the others either feared you or worshipped the ground that you walked on?"

"Stop it."

"That wasn't a no Dean."

Robert felt something run through Dean, an emotion that was too fleeting for him to get a hold on but he could feel the revulsion that Alastair's words caused in Dean and he realised that his hold on him was slipping once again. He realised that a little bit of Dean really did want to just give up and go back.

"Sam." He hoped he would hear the warning in his voice. "We need to finish this now. I can't hold him much longer."

John stepped forward and pulled Jessica from Sam's grip. "Do it. You can put us both back and then get your brother out of here."

Sam looked at Jessica again.

"Do it." John urged him on. "Sam!"

"I'm sorry." He held his hand up and tightened the grip that he had on her, feeling John join her as he did. Sam turned quickly to Robert. "Have you got him?"

"Yes."

Sam closed his eyes and pushed. He felt the slight resistance and then it was gone….they were gone. Sam opened his eyes back up and stared into the cold, unamused eyes of Alastair. "I really thought you'd have had more trouble with that. You're getting more like your brother everyday Sam do you know that? I mean that as a compliment you know." Alastair strode over and pulled Dean from Robert's grasp, the other man finally overcome with his exertions. "Now, Sam I believe you have a choice to make." He looked at Robert. "I don't think that we need you here for this." He touched his head and Robert screamed as his figure disappeared from in front of them.

"What did you do?" Sam started forward but Alastair stopped him with a hand.

"He's fine, I can't send him to Hell…he doesn't have a ticket….not yet anyway. Now where were we…ah yes, a choice…. Dean or Ruby?" Sam dropped his head for a moment and stood as if he was listening to someone, then he looked up and stared at his brother with solemn eyes.

"I'm sorry."

He watched the fear and then the resignation pass across Dean's face. "This isn't what it looks like. I don't hate you."

Dean nodded slightly. _I bet it is a little._ He pushed the thought away.

Sam turned to Alastair again. "Your right. I need Ruby to defeat Lillith." He smiled apologetically at his brother.

"So…I choose my brother. You can send Dean back to Hell."

Alastair stood for a moment, frozen to the spot and then he chuckled loudly. "Did you hear that Dean. You sold your soul to us for him and he wouldn't pick you over the demon bitch? Now that's gotta hurt." He gripped Dean's head in his hand. "Oh, it does too, I can feel all that delicious pain in there Dean. But guess what?" He tightened the grip on Dean's head. "This is going to hurt, much, much more."

Sam felt his brother's scream of agony fill his head and then he was opening his eyes to Ruby's concerned face. He was on the motel room floor. She smiled softly at him.

"Thank you."

Ruby helped him to stand and then stepped back as he sat on the bed next to Dean. He touched his brother's face and almost recoiled at the coldness of his skin. He knew that Robert was glaring at him but he couldn't take his eyes of the form of his brother lying on the motel bed.

He covered his mouth with his hand to stifle the sob that was building inside. "I'm sorry." He brushed Dean's hair and then he stood, needing suddenly to vomit. Robert stopped him before he could get past him.

"What did you just do?"

"What I had to. It had to be him, I couldn't pick Ruby."

"You chose her over your own flesh and blood?"

"No. I couldn't pick Ruby because I need her and we have no way of getting her back this time."

"So what. You don't need Dean? Or do you have a way of getting _Dean_ back?"

Ruby stepped between them. "No. _We_ don't have a way. There's only one thing that can pull a soul out of Hell…except Alastair that is." She turned to the man that had been standing quietly in the shadows of the room and then turned back to Robert. Ruby motioned towards him.

"_He_ has a way. I don't believe you two have met."

Robert looked up and for a moment he could have sworn that the rustle he had heard hadn't just been the man's raincoat.

"My name is Castiel."

"Robert." He took the pro-offered hand and he felt the wave of righteousness that flow from the being in front of him.

The angel turned to Ruby and smiled. "And I believe I told you already that I couldn't help. I told you that my orders forbid it."

Sam turned and caught Ruby's arm. "You told me you'd summoned him." His grip tightened. "Just before I picked you I heard you." He pointed to his head. "In here. You told me he would help." He shook her by the shoulders and then grabbed her face, almost screaming at her. "What did you just make me do!?"

Her smile made his blood run cold. "What you had to."

**Chapter End Notes:**

Well I have to say it firstly - not a deathfic!

Right that's that out the way.

Oh, Sammy....what did you just do?

So will Castiel bend, and will Ruby survive duping Sam? Or doesn't she know something he doesn't? Watch this space.

Previous


	12. Chapter 12

Author's Notes

HI folks, thanks again for the great reviews, only three more chapters including this one to go.

Glad you are enjoying. Sorry this story is cliffhanger central!

Sam has to get Dean back, but how and who will help him?

White plans an attack 

Sam let her go and staggered back against the bed, slumping almost at his brother's feet.

"What have I done?"

He slipped off the bed and curled up into a ball on the floor, rocking back and forward. Ruby knelt in front of him. He lifted his head and glared at her. "Don't you touch me."

Tilting his head to the side, he watched as she raised her hand to her throat, the cold stirring inside him and he smiled as she began to choke.

"Don't." Ruby dropped her head down and forced the words out. "We can…still sort this." She coughed and a little bit of black smoke passed her lips.

"Looks like I finally managed that last bit of cold, hard rage that you couldn't get me to find." He pushed harder and then faltered as he felt her push back, felt her struggle against him. "I could send you down to look for him right now….and you know it."

She felt the binding link on her arm burn as Sam increased the pressure and she would have smiled if it hadn't been her neck on the line, if he was strong enough to break the binding link them she knew she could be in real trouble here.

Ruby pushed again and recovered slightly, raising her head up and grinning at him. "Don't think so Sam, not yet anyway, besides you send me down I'll make sure that he never gets back out."

She held up her hand and coughed another little bit of black smoke, the grin failing as the balance swung back in Sam's favour again, her voice and tact changing to softness and persuasiveness. "Please Sam; I'll get him out, just give me time."

Sam pushed her away, this time with his hands. "Why should I? I give you time and Dean is down there getting tortured while I do." The hurt sounded in his voice. "You tricked me, I trusted you."

Before she could reply Robert gave a loud groan and staggered back, Castiel stepping forward and gripping his arm as he did, stopping him from falling completely. "Sam. Whatever your friend here has got cooked up you better make it work, and quickly."

Sam lifted his head to Robert. "Why?"

"I lost him….I can't feel him anymore. I don't understand." Robert's voice had a little edge of panic in it and the group in the room watched as he closed his eyes, obviously struggling to connect again with the elder Winchester. Silence filled the room for a long moment until it was finally Robert that broke it again, disbelief in his voice as he spoke.

"He's shut me out."

He glared at Sam as he opened his eyes. "Damn you…you did this. I told him I'd help, I told him I'd fix this." He pulled free of the angel's hands and rounded on Sam. "Like I said, so like your father, blinkered to the hurt that you cause your family in the name of revenge."

"It's not like that, Lillith hurt Dean too."

Robert smiled coldly. "Yet I don't see him putting you in front of his need for a little payback, even when Alastair was putting the blame on you he was still trying to defend you, make you believe that it's not all your fault. Well this time…it is. So fix it!"

Sam stood and faced the other man. "I will, I promise."

"Really? Without him…."…Robert gestured to Castiel…. "…just how are you going to do that?"

"I…I'll find someway."

Robert snorted. "Well you'd better hurry before there's nothing left to save." He walked over and sat down on the bed next to Dean, taking his hand and turning his back on the rest of the small group in the room.

Sam sighed a deep, heartfelt sigh. He'd screwed up, this time he truly and utterly screwed up and Dean was paying for it again. He couldn't let that happen. Not again. Sam stood slowly and walked over to the angel.

"Can I talk with you…please?" Castiel paused and for a minute Sam thought that he was going to refuse but then the other man gracefully bowed his head and gestured to the door. Sam walked out and over to the Impala. He turned and sat on the hood, unconsciously running his hands over the cool metal almost as if taking some strength and comfort from the reassuring presence of his brother's car.

He gathered his thoughts and looked up meeting Castiel's eyes. "I need you to bring him back for me. Please. I'll do anything, beg if I have to. Just please help me…help him." Sam dropped his eyes back to floor. "I don't know why I did it, why I listened to her…but I trusted her, you know, she saved me and I trusted her." He let his voice tail off into almost nothing as he finished the sentence. "She betrayed me."

"Just as you did to him…he trusted you to help him too Sam, he needed you to help him, and now you just expect me to clear the mess up just as you always expected him to do before me."

Sam's eyes were pleading when they looked up again. "You saved him before; you need him for something…why won't you help him now?"

"My orders…"

Sam didn't let him finish, his voice loud as he interrupted. "Screw your orders." He sounded so like his brother as he said it, it made him pause and drop his voice down. "Dean doesn't deserve to be there, he never did…if anything it should be me, I'm the one that has evil inside me…not him."

Castiel sighed quietly. "Then why did you send him back, does your revenge against Lillith mean that much to you that you would willing sacrifice Dean to get it?"

Sam didn't answer.

Castiel walked over and sat next to Sam on the car hood. "I pulled your brother from the pit because God commanded it, but that was a one time only deal…my orders after that are very specific."

Sam turned his head slightly. "So what are your orders now. What is more important than saving my brother?"

"Besides saving the world?" Sam thought that Castiel was going to laugh at him. "Dean didn't tell you, did he?"

"Tell me what?"

"I have other things to attend to for him." Castiel's glance upward left Sam in no doubt who 'him' was. "God's main orders though were to follow his orders."

Sam looked confused. "But his orders where to save Dean from the pit."

Castiel smiled as if Sam was a small child that didn't get how the world worked. "No…not to follow God's orders… to follow Dean's orders. I have to come if he calls me."

"What?"

"God sent me to rescue him and then to help him in anyway that he asked."

"So help him then." Sam was almost to the point of exasperation; no wonder talking to the angels seemed to drain Dean so much.

"I can't. He hasn't asked. I am to follow Dean's orders. I can't help now unless Dean orders me to…and he can't do that…."

Light finally dawned on Sam's brain. "…because I sent him to Hell."

Sam ran his fingers through his hair and quelled the urge to scream.

Then he stopped.

"Robert!"

He stood up and headed back into the motel room.

----

_He was cold. _

_The air all around him was frigid and he hugged into himself to try and keep what little warmth he had left inside him. There was no light where he was and the silence around him was so complete you could almost hear it. _

_The only true sounds were in his head, the hitch of his breath, the boom of his heartbeat. _

_Sam had picked Ruby over him, he knew what Dean had gone through before down here and he'd still let him be taken. He swore that he would save him from Alastair sending him here and yet he had sealed the deal himself. He was abandoned and alone. Dean felt the shakes starting again. He wouldn't cry, he scolded himself. Not down here. Not were they could see him. _

_The light startled him and he lifted his arm to shield his eyes as it drew brighter and wider. The heat slowly started to seep through him and he groaned as the stench assaulted his senses. He hated that smell, the smell of decay and burning flesh, and the way that it had haunted him top-side as well, never fully letting him believe that he was free. Never letting him escape the fear that he would at some point open his eyes from sleep and the smell would be real again. This would be real again. Well he had and now it was. _

_A figure stepped forward in the light in front of him, a small child, her dress a pretty cream with a ribbon of blood red in her hair and a smile that was almost angelic in it's joy at seeing him…angelic if you didn't know what hid behind it. She stopped in front of him, almost hopping on the spot with delight and he shivered again as she said his name. _

_"Dean!" She closed the gap and lifted his face to hers. "It's so good to see you again. Did you miss me? I told you that you'd be back…just didn't think that it would be so soon." She did a little dance on the spot and he felt his heart drop at her next words. "I've got a little surprise for you." _

_He stole himself for what was coming next, closing his eyes almost in the hope that she would just be a figment of his imagination and that if he wished hard enough she'd just disappear. Her hands digging into the flesh on his face told him that that was not to be. "Open your eyes." The cold voice that made the demand brokered no disobedience. _

_He opened them. _

_The innocence was gone and in its place was a look that had no place on the face of such a small child. "You're been very naughty. First you left us without saying goodbye and then your brother spoiled Alastair's game, made him change the rules. You know that he doesn't like that. Alastair spent such a long time setting us the game, choosing just the right souls to torture you, to help push your brother to the edge and then you spoiled it." She tucked her hand under his chin again and pulled his head towards her, red flicking briefly through the eyes that stared into his. "You weren't supposed to talk to them Dean, they weren't suppose to end up taking your side." _

_Lillith shook her head and wagged her finger in his face. "Very, very naughty." She smiled at him again. "You know what happens down here if you disobey, if you don't play by the rules…don't you Dean?" _

_He nodded. _

_Alastair's punishments were cruel but Lillith's….Lillith's were vicious. Dean had suffered through them already. He didn't intend to do it again. He couldn't. _

_"They'll all have to be punished you know that, for helping you." Dean watched as the figures where brought before where he sat. "I'm going to torture them because of you and then if there is anything left…I'm going to make you finish it for them." She brushed her fingers through his hair. "Then we'll have to see about punishing that brother of yours and his little precious Ruby, a little revenge will be good for your soul Dean, just like before. Perhaps I'll let you teach them that the game has to be played properly. I mean where would we be without rules Dean. In chaos, that's where. What do you say Dean?" _

_She looked at him with the little girl innocence on her face again. "Of course, if you wanted to…I'd let you take their place." She waved at the souls in front of her. _

_"No." Dean tried to look down as he spoke but she wouldn't let him, instead she tapped her foot impatiently. _

_"Dean?" _

_He looked up and forced a smile onto his face. He knew how this game was played. "No… thank you." _

_"Nice to see that you at least have learnt your lesson down here Dean, so smart and pretty. We're going to have some fun." _

_He felt the tears finally slide down his cheeks as she turned back to the others. _

---

Robert shook his head. "I've lost him, I told you that."

"I know but isn't there a way to reach him still, you said that you were connected, how can you just loose that?"

Robert looked at Dean's body and then back to Sam. "I didn't loose it as such. He's blocking me somehow. I can still feel a bit of what he's feeling but I can't reach him like I did before, he won't let me."

Sam looked shocked. "He won't let you? Why would he do that?"

"Perhaps he doesn't want anyone to see what he is going through, what they are making him do." Castiel moved closer and put a hand on Sam's shoulder. "Perhaps he is ashamed."

"Why do I get the feeling that you know more than you are letting on?" Sam brushed the hand away.

"I saw what he did the last time he was down there….it wasn't pretty and it haunts him." Castiel stepped over to Robert. "You still have a connection with him of sorts?" Robert nodded. "Then we can reach him." Castiel turned to Sam. "You can reach him."

"I can?"

"Idiot!" Robert slapped his head and grabbed Sam's hand. "Of course." He pulled Sam down beside him. "Remember I told you that your gift works both ways? You can get me or yourself in. Or both."

Castiel spoke. "If you can get him to listen to you, you can tell him to ask me for my help, if he does then I can pull him free. I can pull you all free."

Sam sighed, if only it was that easy, just get Dean to listen to him. "And if he doesn't?"

"Then there isn't anything else we can do."


	13. Chapter 13

Author's Notes

Thank you as always for the lovely reviews, I hope to post the last of this over the weekend or Monday at the latest.

More twists and turns in this one!

Pawns become Knights

Sam cornered the angel as Robert readied himself for his journey. Robert knew it would be harder than just reaching in to Dean's mind and soul, he would have to reach for him through Hell itself and if something got in the way, or if Dean didn't want to be saved, then it could all end badly. Only the angel was guaranteed to be able to pull them out and if Dean wouldn't ask, Robert wasn't sure that he would even try and get them back either. Sam might be able to get them out if he got them in but, he knew, the barriers to Hell weren't designed to keep travellers out, getting in was so not the problem.

Robert tried to calm himself and sit patiently as Ruby drew the sigils on him that would protect and guide him, watching carefully to ensure that they were right. He didn't trust her but at the moment he had no choice but to use her, just as he was going to use Sam. He was getting Dean back; nothing was going to prevent him doing that.

Sam paced the room. This was taking too long, every minute that Dean was down there was a minute more that Sam felt he had failed him. He glanced over again to the angel, Castiel was sitting quietly waiting for his turn to act. Sam walked over. "If we hit a problem can you help us?"

"That depends."

"On what?"

"How far you get. If you are too far in I may not be able to unless Dean wants me to, besides I shouldn't be helping at all when you are using your gift, even if your brother asks."

Sam was curious. "Why?"

"Because it would be frowned on by others. The penalty for disobedience is high." Castiel stood and walked away ending the conversation.

"We're ready." Ruby stood and backed away from Robert turning to Sam. "You need to connect with Robert first and then instead of pushing him down and letting go, you need to stay with him and guide him." She paused and Sam saw the faintest flicker of concern in her eyes and then it was gone. "Alright, find me first."

Sam was sitting down next to Robert as she spoke to him and he looked at her. "What?"

"You know your way around Hell then do you?" She put her hands on her hips and tilted her head.

"No, but…."

"Just do it before I change my mind again." She lent in. "Really, truly, Sam, I don't care if you never get Dean back, he hates me and I'm not really that fond of him but you want this and you chose me so I figure I owe you. Do you want to do this on your own?"

Robert chipped into the conversation. "I think I'd rather go without you, no offence."

Ruby folded her arms. "Fine, whatever, your funerals. I prefer that option anyway." She walked off and threw herself down on the edge of the empty bed in the room.

"Robert, she could help." Sam turned his gaze to the older man.

"No. I don't want to be watching my back and looking for your brother at the same time." He took Sam's hand. "Let's get this done."

Sam took one last look at Ruby and saw the relief written on her face. Thinking that maybe her offer had been genuine he smiled at her and then closed his eyes. "Yeah, let's."

---

_Dean opened his eyes and couldn't for a minute figure out just where he was. It was a beautiful spring day, the sun warm on his back and the sky a vibrant mix of shades of blue. He blinked at the brightness and the confusion in his mind. _

_He looked down at the bloody gloves that were his hands and took off his shirt, trying to wipe the drying blood from them with it as he walked up the path of the house he had somehow arrived at. This place was familiar to him, the house, the door that he was standing in front of, he had no idea what had happened. Had Sam saved him? Was this another, better dream?…then it hit him. _

_They'd found his safe place. _

_The place he had dreamed about when it all got to much to bear. Lillith opened the door of Lisa Braeden's house and smiled at him. A Lillith that looked so much like Lisa that for a moment it stole his breath from him. "This is lovely Dean, so….suburban. I didn't think you had it in you to lust after something like this….or maybe it the pretty girl that lives here that seals the deal for you." She stood back and waved him in with a hand. A bloody hand. He felt his own blood chill. __"What are you doing here? How did you find this?" Dean instinctively pulled away from her as he slid past her and inside the house. _

_"You were thinking about it as you tortured the souls Dean, really have to learn to keep your mind on the job." She turned as she spoke, beckoning him to follow her. _

_Dean walked up the stairs behind her and stopped at the trail of blood and water that was flowing under the bathroom door. Lillith chuckled as he looked at her in horror. "What did you do?" He started forward and stopped. _

_"Don't worry….I left you something to play with." _

_He put his hand to the door and pushed. _

_"NO!" _

_He screamed the word as he walked forward and knelt beside the bath tub, reaching in and pulling the bloody figure to him. _

_"NO!" _

_He threw back his head and screamed again as Lisa opened her eyes, her face a bloody mask. "Dean?" She managed the word before her eyes slipped closed again and she went limp in his arms. _

---

Robert and Sam were lost, the heat and the stench threatening to overcome them both. All around them the souls screamed and touch them on their way by, pleas for help and forgiveness flooded their thoughts.

"He's here, I can feel him but there's too much noise, too many voices all asking for my help…I can't focus." Robert placed his hands to his head and Sam reached out to him, tightening his grasp and trying to help him sort though the muddle of sounds.

Robert felt it a mere moment before he heard it. Dean's cry slammed into him, assaulting him with its ferociousness, drowning everything else out. Sam let out a little cry of his own before he called his brother's name. The answering reply made him light up inside and he reached for his brother to pull him to him.

----

_Lillith turned as she heard the call, understanding of what it meant crossing both Dean's face and her own at the same time. His brother had come for him, he hadn't left him, he had a way out. She reached down and hauled Dean to his feet even as he answered his brother and she felt the relief flooding him. "No, this isn't happening again….you're mine. You belong to me." _

_Dean could hear Sam's voice in his head, speaking to him, telling him that he had a way out, that Castiel would help him once more….all he had to do was ask. He raised his hands and gripped Lillith's face in them. "I'd tell you to go to Hell and everything but seeing as we're already there." He leaned right into her space. "This is not over bitch…you can count on that." He let her go, pushing her back as he did. _

_"Save me." He didn't have to shout, Castiel could hear him, Sam had made sure of that. _

_The light was blinding as it reach down and touched him, throwing Lillith further away from him, her cry of rage lost in the rushing sound as he was dragged upwards. He caught his breath and paused only for a moment before he spoke again. "Save all of us."_

He felt something tug at his heel and then his chest was burning as oxygen was pushed into his lungs and he drew a hitching breath before he rolled onto his side and threw up on the floor next to the bed in the motel room.

Castiel caught him as he tried to force himself up. "Easy, give yourself some time. Did you feel that?" Castiel looked at Dean and he nodded.

"Yeah, I felt that."

"Was it…..?" Castiel didn't have to voice the name, Dean knew that he was talking about Lillith, the tug was her latching to him and the angel had felt it too.

Dean nodded again. "She'll keep. I need my phone." Dean righted himself on the edge of the bed, skilfully avoiding putting his feet in the mess that he had just made. He realised that Sam and Robert were lying in a heap at the bottom of the other bed but Ruby was helping them and he had a more immediate concern.

"Phone." More urgent this time and Castiel looked round him and then handed over Dean's jacket that was lying over the chair in the room. Dean dug through the pockets frantically.

Castiel touched his shoulder. "You need to rest." Dean pulled the phone from his pocket and held up a finger to silence the angel. Flipping the phone he accessed the speed dial and found the number that he was looking for. It was answered on the third ring and Dean collapsed back on the bed at the sound of the voice.

"Hello?"

He cleared his throat and tried for his best attempt at a normal voice. "Lisa. Hi." He paused as he realised that he had no idea what to say next.

"Dean? Is that you?" Lisa's voice was bright and clear at the end of the phone and he felt his heart calm even as she spoke just those few words to him.

"Lisa, yeah…listen…Sam and I are gonna be over your way in a coupla weeks, just checking that it was ok to swing by and say hi?"

She laughed. He grinned. "Yeah, that would be great…funny Ben was just asking about you the other day."

"That's cool, it'll be good to see you both." He was aware that his brother had recovered and was looking at him with a concerned and puzzled look on his face. "Listen Lisa it was just a quick call, I'll speak to you later ok? I gotta book. Sorry."

"No worries. Call me when you're in town and we'll meet up."

"Yeah, I will." He ran his free hand across his face, feeling awkward now. "Well, bye."

"Bye Dean. Take care."

"I will Lisa. Bye"

He waited until she had hung up and then closed the phone and let it drop to the bed. His head was pounding and his chest still felt as it the air was liquid acid, but it was easing. It had just been another torture, it hadn't been real. No matter how it had felt.

"What was that all about?" Sam sat down next to him and tried to check him over but Dean rolled onto his side and pushed away, sitting back up on the edge of the bed. "Nothing…I…it was nothing." He looked up at Castiel and smiled. "Thank you…again."

"I only did as you asked."

"Yeah, well, thanks anyway for listening to me then. At least someone does." He pushed up off the bed, paused to get his balance and walked slowly over to the door.

"Dean are you ok?" Sam gripped his arm to stop him but he let go at the look on his brother's face.

"_Don't_ touch me." He opened the door and went to walk outside. "I need some air."

"Dean…I'm sorry." Sam hovered unsure whether to follow or fall back.

"I know you are Sam." Dean didn't even turn. "So am I."

Castiel followed him out. "Lillith is near and Alastair will come after us you know that."

"Yeah, you feel that too, she's here isn't she? All we've got is Sam and one little knife." Dean turned to him. "I don't suppose that you've got any ideas how we stop them?"

Castiel smiled. "Actually, now that you ask…."

"Forgot I'd have to ask." Dean tilted his head and stared at him. "What?"

---

Ruby was talking as Castiel came back inside. Sam watched the wary look that the angel gave her and felt the need to stand, putting himself between them. Castiel continued to stare until he was passed her and then he moved over nearer Robert.

She looked at Sam. "So we should move, Alastair's had his game spoiled for a second time and now we've managed to annoy Lillith into the bargain…this isn't going to end well."

"How did you know that Lillith was there? Only Dean and I were in that part of Hell." Castiel stepped back towards her as he spoke.

"You said." She stepped back from the advancing angel.

"No, he didn't." Robert stepped round behind Castiel sensing the danger.

"How did you know that Ruby?" Sam stepped forward but Robert put a restraining hand on his arm.

Ruby smiled at them."I never could remember what had been said and where it had been said."

"Lillith." Sam let the name slip from his lips.

"Live and in the flesh…well not my flesh but still, you get the picture. Meat hooked your brother on the way out and he never even felt it." She raised her hand to him. "You've grown up all pretty and strong thanks to this bitch in here with me, but I don't think your quite strong enough yet to take me." She spread her arms wide. "Like to take a shot?"

Sam raised his hand and tried to latch onto just Lillith and pull her out but he couldn't concentrate enough to separate her from Ruby and his powers where weakening, the strain of searching for Dean taking it's toll on him. He realised that he couldn't break the binding link on his own for now.

Lillith's smile was pure saccharin as she took a hesitant step forward, still eyeing the angel warily. "I'm going to throw you into the deepest, darkest pit in Hell Sam, and make sure that you never climb out again."

Sam watched as the door opened and he tried to call out a warning as his brother stepped through but it died in his throat as Dean stepped forward and slipped his arms round the body in front of him.

Ruby's body.

Sam felt a little pang of jealousy running through him at the action and then he was pulled back by the sound of his brother's voice.

Dean pulled Lillith closer to him. "We really have to teach these boys how to play nice, don't we?" He ran his hands down her in a gentle caress and placed a tender kiss to her neck. "You weren't starting the party without me were you?"

Her voice sounded of pleased shock. "Alastair?"

Dean chuckled behind her. She tried to turn but he tightened his grip.

"Looks like the gang is all here. Why don't we get started finishing this then?" He withdrew his arms for a moment and pulled Ruby's knife from the band of his jeans before encircling Lillith again and placing a kiss to her face then nuzzling her ear with his lips.

Sam couldn't think straight. He looked at Dean and Ruby and knew that something wasn't right with the picture presenting itself in front of him, but he couldn't really think of anything apart from the fact that it was _Dean and Ruby_. Alastair and Lillith he mentally corrected himself. A little niggle was eating away at him but he didn't know what it was. He heard Robert mutter a curse quietly under his breath and then a little gasp escaped him and he stared at Dean and then Castiel before dropping his eyes to the floor.

"Why don't we start with the angel and work our way down the food chain?" Dean ran his hands down her side and rested them on her hips, his chin resting on her shoulder as he almost whispered the words to her.

Lillith smiled and lent into the embrace. "That sounds like a plan to me."


	14. Chapter 14

A/N - Hi folks, well nearly there with this one so as you have all been great with reviewing this and I have struggled so badly to reply I'm going to post this one and the last one together.

Enjoy!

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Checkmate

Sam noticed Dean and Castiel share a small, almost sly, smile and then Dean lowered his head to look down at Lillith again. "Don't you wonder if an angel of the lord bleeds like everything else does?" He let his grip on Lillith slacken and let her close the gap on Castiel. "Why don't we find out?"

He stepped to the side and raised the knife as Castiel raised his arm, apparently in defence, and Dean punched into it breaking the skin of the angel's host. The blood ran down the blade of the knife, slowly pooling at the hilt and Dean pulled it out and chuckled softly. "Well what do you know. It's red too. Though it would be blue at least, heavenly royalty and all that."

Lillith laughed and reached for his face but paused at the look on it.

Dean's next movement was quick, he gripped Lillith's hair and dragged her back to him, the hate showing now on his face. "What I really want to see though is what angel blood will do to something like you." He raised the knife and plunged it into her neck then threw her forward onto the floor.

She rolled and started to choke. "What are you doing?"

"What I promised." He knelt down beside her and raised the knife again. Realisation dawned on her face as she looked up at him. "Winchester!" She spat the word at him.

"That's me. _Just me_." Lifting the knife clear of his head he plunged it down only for someone to stop him part of the way there. He lifted his face to look into that of his brother's.

"Ruby." Sam only said the one word and then he pulled the knife and his brother's hand down and sliced through the binding link on Lillith's arm. Raising his arm quickly he summoned every single piece of strength that he had left and yanked Ruby free, panic driving him, letting the smoke drift idly in the room. Dean pushed him off and lent through the blackness bringing the knife down and through the heart of the body beneath him, twisting it as he did.

Lillith gave a jerk and stared at him open-eyed. "Dean." His name slipped past her lips as the angel knelt beside her and touched her head. A small cry escaped her and then she jerked again and lay still.

Everything seemed to stand still for a moment and then Robert stepped forward and took Dean's arm helping him to his feet. "Are you ok? Nice feint there, you had me going for just a little minute there Dean but then I realised that I knew it was you, I could feel it."

It dawned on Sam then that that was what had been wrong when his brother had stepped into the room; he hadn't felt the tingle that usually heralded Alastair's presence.

Robert hovered near the body on the floor. "Is she…are they dead?"

"Don't know. Don't care." Dean shot his brother a fleeting glance. "Ruby's out somewhere thanks to lover boy here and Lillith? Lillith's a maybe but I think it's more likely that we've just sent her somewhere real bad for awhile."

"Yes." Castiel confirmed Dean's thoughts. "Not dead, wounded and banished….for now. She will be after revenge when she has healed. She'll come for us."

"Let her try." Dean bent and put his hands on his knees, trying to fight the tiredness in him. Castiel went to him but he waved him away. "I'm good."

Robert cast a look to both men. "So are we leaving now before she gets back or Alastair really gets here? Can you dispatch him too with that neat little angel blood and demon-slaying knife combo?"

"No idea." Dean went to bend down to retrieve the knife from the floor, swaying slightly as he did. Robert stopped him and took the knife from the floor, turning it over in his hand as he did. "What is it that makes this so special anyway?"

"Again, no idea, but it works so I'm not complaining." Dean took it back from him and tucked it back into his back waistband.

"Yeah and we have it thanks to Ruby. I'm able to do what I do…thanks to Ruby. Nice way you were about to repay her back." Sam locked eyes with his brother, his anger bubbling below the surface.

Dean however, didn't want to fight, he just didn't have the energy to spare. That didn't mean though that he was about to let his brother off for now without a little payback. He walked up to Sam. "Sorry, didn't have a choice." He paused to let the words and the tone sting a little. "Besides she's your hell buddy, not mine." He turned back to Robert. ""I don't think that the knife will get rid of Alastair though, even with the angel blood…he's different from the others." Robert went to speak and Dean held up a hand and pre-empted his question. "I don't know how, he just is."

Sam went to say something and stopped, huffed, grabbed up his bag and stormed out the door.

Dean sighed and Robert moved over to him. "You." He stuck a finger in Dean's chest. "Need to rest."

"I'm fine." Dean didn't want to admit that he felt anything but fine even though he knew that Robert could feel.

"No, you're not. I've seen ghosts with better colour and as for what I'm feeling…I'm surprised that your still standing."

"Yeah, well I'm tougher than I look. Let's just get out of here and then we can see to me." Dean grabbed the few things that were lying around and shoved them in to the bag on the table.

Robert paused for a moment. "Why didn't you tell him? He's mad at you for no reason now."

"He saved Ruby, not me. I was quite happy to send her back with Lillith. She's safe for now until she finds another host." Dean pushed past him to the door, pausing only for a moment to gather himself and then walked out into the car park. Robert and the angel followed him out.

---

Sam felt it as he was throwing his bag into the trunk. The tingle through him that meant only one thing. He readied himself and turned, straight into the punch.

---

Dean was almost at the Impala when he realised that something was wrong. His brother wasn't in the car and the trunk was lying open. "Sam?!" He turned to scan the car park, stopping when he took in the other man standing against an old Ford. A man with his brother on his knees at his feet, Sam's arm twisted behind him and Alastair's foot on his back.

"You just don't now when to quit do you." He stared Alastair down, the initial fear at seeing him morphing into anger inside him, the little flame spreading as the events of the night took it's toll on his control and his caution. "Let him go."

"Now Dean you're not sore at me 'cos I hurt you?"

Dean was at least up to a little verbal sparring, besides it would give him time to figure out what the hell to do next. He grinned at Alastair. "No, I'm sore at you 'cos you made my brother cry, that wasn't nice."

Alastair chortled at Dean's tone. "Nice isn't in my job description."

"Well we finally have something in common…it isn't in mine either. Not when it comes to something like you."

"You can't kill me you know, and I don't care if you send me back, I can just climb right back out."

"I know…doesn't mean that I'm not gonna have fun trying."

"What? And hurt this fine human I'm possessing." Alastair ran his free hand down the length of his body. "What happened to the caring Dean Winchester that I knew?"

"You killed me." Sam raised his head briefly at the pain in his brother's voice that sounded for just a brief second. "Just like you killed the guy that you're wearing….and yes I know he's dead…'cos I know that you don't like to share anything Alastair…not this guy's body…not me…that's why you're here it's it? To claim back what's yours? See, here's the thing though Alastair, you can't share what doesn't belong to you…and I don't belong to you…I belong to me...so get over it."

"Ah…glad to see you've got your fighting spirit back there Dean. I was beginning to wonder if I'd broken you completely." Alastair chuckled. "You two are just too easy but I must say I wasn't expecting Sammy here to hatch his little escape plan. Very clever, stupid move but beautifully executed. Still, I don't like to loose bodies from my little fun house, not once and certainly not twice. Disobedience brings punishment. You of all people should now that Dean." Alastair gripped Sam's hair tightly and pressed harder down on his back. Sam groaned as something in it shifted unpleasantly.

"Sam? You ok?" Dean took a step closer to them. "I swear to God if you touch him I will _hunt_ you down through Hell itself."

Sam lifted his head slightly to look at him and Dean suddenly had an idea, a little past memory stirring in him.

Robert looked up from where he was standing next to Castiel and frowned at the shift in emotions in the man in front of him. He put a restraining hand on Dean's arm. "You're not up to this." He was shrugged off.

Alastair looked realised that Ruby was missing and spoke to Dean. "So the demon bitch is gone? I presume she grew a brain and left or did Lillith get her before you got Lillith?" Alastair tilted his head. "Lillith says hi, by the way….and when she get back from where you sent her….let's just say, I wouldn't like to be you. She's just a little mad with you."

The demon took in the small group and gestured at them, shaking his head. "So this…this is the best that God could scrounge up to save the world." He threw his arms wide. "A half demon…" …he kicked Sam down further…. "….an atheist who's got a kink for pain, drink and loose women…." ….Dean returned the sarcastic smile… "….and an angel with faith issues…." …Alastair laughed. "And you." He pointed at Robert. "You shouldn't even be here. Azazel was supposed to have taken care of all the family, never could get the staff."

He turned back to Dean. "Maybe God thinks he can bore me to death before I break the seals?"

"Maybe he thinks he doesn't need anything more than someone who knows how to take down a bully? It's not like you like a straight fight now, it is? Always have to have the deck loaded in your favour, don't you?"

"Not at all Dean, I'm not adverse to a square go. What do you have in mind?"

"Let my brother go first."

The demon raised his finger to his lips and tilted his head as he mulled over the request. "Ok." Alastair pulled Sam to his feet and threw him at Dean, the surprise of the action and the force behind it almost taking him down, only Robert's steadying presence behind him stopping it. "Let's see what you got then Dean? No tricks, no holding back. Hit me with your best shot." The arrogance shone in his smile.

Dean righted his brother and brushed off the front of his jacket. "Sam, do you remember Simon Fletcher?"

Sam turned to him, confusion on his face. "Simon Fletcher?" He wracked his brain. "From school back in Freemont?"

Dean smiled. "The very one."

"Yeah. Why?"

"Do you remember what I showed you then?" Sam nodded still not sure where Dean was taking this.

Alastair yawned. "Yeah, definitely trying to bore me." He folded his arms and stared at Dean. "Are we gonna do this anytime soon?"

Dean smiled at him. "Simon was a bully that picked on my brother at school. He was in my year and he hated me."

"Can sympathise with that." Alastair looked at his nails and then back up.

Dean ignored the jibe. "So he decided that to get to me he'd pick on Sam, even though he knew he could beat me in a straight fight."

Sam looked at his brother and nodded as the little pieces of the memory started slipping into place. "Yeah, you tried to take him down on your own, only he was too strong. Guy was built like a house."

"You always do try to bite off more than you can chew, don't you Dean? No brains or thought just brawn and action." Alastair goaded him but Dean ignored him, continuing to speak to his brother.

"So do you remember what we did?" Sam felt Dean shift to the side and caught his glance towards Castiel. The angel moved closer.

Sam grinned. "We took him down together."

"Stronger as a family." Dean almost whispered the words.

Sam paused and then touched his brother's shoulder. "Yeah. We are." He gave Dean a small grin.

Dean grinned back at him and lifted his arm, closing his eyes for a minute as he did. He spoke as he opened them. "Yeah, I held him…."

"….and I hit him." Sam raised his own arm and gave his brother a questioning look.

Alastair started to move towards them, sensing at the last moment that something was off.

Dean smiled. "Bring it."


	15. Chapter 15

**Author's Chapter Notes:**

Well, here is the final chapter folks.

This has been a strange little story, but I hope that you have enjoyed it. I know that most people think of Ruby as a black hearted as well as black eyed b*tch (she does have her moments – lots of them) but I've gone a little different route here!

Thanks for all the support on this one, I have a few others waiting in the wings to be finished and then I post.

Here' s go……..

Game Over

It was Dean's turn to chuckle as he pushed out and stopped Alastair in his tracks.

The demon raised his eyebrows almost at the same time Sam did. "How?" It was Alastair that managed the question first.

"Ruby didn't get very far." He never took his eyes off the demon in front of him but he could tell that Sam was standing opened mouthed, staring at him.

"She didn't….you mean she's with you…_inside?_"

Dean never took his eyes off Alastair. "Can we chat about this later?"

Sam turned back to the demon, his strength buoyed by the knowledge that Ruby was safe and reached out, surrounding Alastair with his power. "This time…you're going down. We're gonna take you down. Together." He pulled and was rewarded with trails of smoke filtering from the mouth of the man in front of him.

"Cheating again boys? That is so not nice." Alastair took a faltering step forward. Dean closed his eyes and put everything he had into keeping him at a distance, helping Ruby push back at the darkness that was trying to break them both. Being the host for Ruby opened Dean up to Alastair's evilness more so than he had ever felt he had in hell, he felt the badness trying to seep into his bones, invade him and then he realised that Alastair was trying to possess him, take him down by taking him over.

"No." He felt Sam react to the single word and knew that his brother understood what was happening here. The choking sensation hit him as Alastair tried to force his way in, but the demon was fighting on two fronts and his efforts were weakened accordingly.

Sam realised that Dean was struggling, even with Ruby's help and he unconsciously reached out for his brother's hand to lend him his support. As their fingers clasped Dean felt the jolt course through him as Sam somehow joined the fight going on inside him. He felt Alastair being pushed back a lot more forcefully that he had been and then he felt the chill of Sam's invasion into his mind and soul and he buckled slightly under it.

Robert stepped forward, gripping Dean, shoring up his defences with his own mind and keeping him on his feet. Sam turned his attention back to Alastair as he felt his brother and Ruby get their own hold on the demon back. "Leave my brother alone."

"Sure it's your brother your worried about or the fact that your girl is in there with him? That must be fun for him, Ruby always was a little bit of a slut." Alastair smiled. "But then again so is your brother. Do you think she's comparing notes?"

"I said….leave..my..brother..alone." Sam anger slowly built inside him and he pushed again, harder this time, unconsciously wiping the blood from his nose as it trickled down his face. He felt Alastair weaken under the onslaught.

"Impressive Sammy, really. No control over it properly yet though, have you? It's destroying you almost as much as it's getting me."

"Really?" Sam changed tact this time and pulled hard, one shot of the most power he could muster. Alastair fell to his knees and the black smoke oozed from his nose and mouth this time. Sam kept pulling even as he felt the power in him ebb slightly. Alastair was almost out although Sam wasn't sure if he had the strength to send him down after getting him free of his host.

He felt it as Dean lost his grip on the demon, felt Ruby struggle to right it, he tightened his grip on Dean's hand and realised that if he tried to help him he'd loose their one shot at halting Alastair. His moment of indecision almost cost them both dearly as Alastair sensed it and fought back. Sam had no option but to focus all his attention on the now advancing demon even as beside him Dean went down, taking Robert with him.

Dean was mumbling and Robert lent in to try and hear what he was saying. "The knife. I can't. Finish it…please."

Robert grabbed the knife from Dean's waistband and then turned, realising that the angel had stepped up behind him. "He wasn't asking you." Castiel took the knife and sliced into his arm again.

Alastair's grin failed as he saw the angel approach. He knew that he couldn't fight it, Ruby and Sam. He tried to latch onto the weakest link in the chain, tried to drag Dean's soul over to him but something was stopping him, this time he was surprised to find that the something was Ruby.

He tried one last time to divide and conquer.

"If you let me have him, you'll have a host." He tried to bargain with Ruby.

"I can get another host….in fact I have to. I ain't staying in this one." She threw a look at Sam. " If I let you have him this time, I lose Sam, I won't do that. You've lost this one Alastair, why don't you just go somewhere and lick your wounds?"

"Sam's really got you licked hasn't he? You know that you want Dean out of the way, I can do that for you. The other one will get over it, he's done it before."

His attention on Ruby made his grip on Dean slip slightly and the elder Winchester took back control. Raising his head Dean grinned at him. "Ruby always picks the winning team Alastair. You know that. This time…that would be Team Winchester. You've lost…get over it."

Castiel stepped over and drove the knife into Alastair as Sam continued to pull, then he touched the head of the demon's host and Sam knew that it was all over. He pulled Alastair free with one final effort and they watched as the black smoke drifted almost lazily away. Sam knew that he hadn't really beaten Alastair, that Alastair had left, but still he felt a small flame of satisfaction in him that for now they had beaten him back….for now he would leave them alone.

"Dean." Sam was down at his brother's side immediately the battle was done. He raised Dean's head up to look at him.

"Sam." He knew it was Ruby that he was talking to. "Dean needs to get somewhere to rest."

Sam pulled his brother up into his arms. "Is he ok? Why is it you and not him that's talking? I want to speak with him."

"Sam. He's ok. Really. He's just completely exhausted." It felt strange talking to his brother, about his brother. Robert helped him get Dean to his feet and into the car and Sam was grateful that Ruby was there, he knew that she was helping Dean rest….taking control for now. They put him into the passenger seat and Sam rounded the car. "Let's go, before he decides to come back." He slid in and waited until his companions had settled in the car and then he headed out.

"Where do you want to go?" He looked at his brother, forgetting for a moment that Ruby was in charge. He watched as she backed off and let Dean through.

"Only one place to go." Dean closed his eyes and slumpt against the window.

Sam smiled and headed to the highway and the route to South Dakota.

---

Bobby watched as the weary looking, rag tag band wound it's way up his front steps.

"I have beds for the humans but the angel is on God's good grace."

Dean smiled at Bobby's attempt at a joke. "Glad to see you too."

Castiel missed the humour. "I don't need a place to rest, besides I should be going, they will be back at some point and we may need more than just me."

"You're going to fetch other angels….here?" Castiel saw the worried look that Dean cast in Sam's direction.

"I have to, we don't really have a choice." He too looked in Sam's direction. "Although maybe not here….not just yet."

Dean motioned to him and they walked out onto the porch. He placed a hand on the angel's shoulder. "Thank you...." he glanced again at his brother through the open door. "….for everything."

"You're brother's activities will not have gone unnoticed. There maybe trouble ahead for him."

"I know, do you think I could bargain with the others? Their need of me against their fear of my brother?"

Castiel laughed a little light laugh. "If anyone can….it would be you Dean." He grew serious. "Be careful. Lillith and Alastair are bad enemies to have and they seem to want to get Sam to go over as badly as they want to see the seals broken. They also seem to want to use you at the bait to do it….him letting you get taken to hell was a step in the wrong direction."

"I know. I don't aim to let them do that. No matter the cost to me."

"That is what I'm afraid of, remember God had a reason for saving you, even if we don't know what it is yet, getting rid of you may be part of their plan."

Dean smiled. "Let then try and if God wants my help, he'll need to help my brother or leave him alone, we come as a package."

Castiel held Dean's attention, his eyes serious and worried. "Just as long as your brother knows that."

Dean's smile slipped. "He does. Lillith hurt him, he felt he had failed me because of her. It's the reason he wants to destroy her so badly. He gets a little tunnel vision where she's concerned."

"I understand, just watch that he doesn't destroy you at the same time."

"He won't, take more than he can muster to take me down, beside I have my own guardian angel at my beck and call." He chuckled slightly at Castiel's face.

"That you have, but for now I have to go. Take care Dean and next time call me when you need me….don't have a demon do it for you or leave it until it is almost too late."

Dean went to speak but instead flinched as the angel disappeared, only the small disturbance of the air to show that he'd ever been there in the first place. He was aware of a movement behind him.

"Hey kid, you ok?" Bobby walked over and lent on the porch rail as Dean lowered himself down onto the top step and rested his head against were Bobby was leaning.

"Peachy."

"Sam filled me in on the highlights of what's been happening since the bitch called me and asked for the summoning ritual. I woulda headed over but I had a job to finish that I couldn't leave. I'm sorry." He reached down and touched Dean shoulder, giving it a gentle squeeze.

"Hey, it's fine. It all turned out ok. Don't sweat it."

"I'll finish off the protection now that you boys are all here, I waited so that Ruby could get in. Were is Ruby anyhow?"

Dean forced himself to his feet and grinned. "If I told you….you wouldn't believe me. Just watch what you're saying about her around me though. I may find the unusual urge to leap to her defence."

Bobby looked at him for a moment and then the light dawned. "Sam didn't tell me that. Well that could be awkward. Her being in you and her being Sam's squeeze and all."

"Don't, _even_ go there Bobby. This is a situation that's about to be rectified. Can you leave that door open for her for a little while longer?" He slapped the elder hunter on the back and walked back into the house and then into the bathroom. Pulling the little cord he switched on the light above the mirror and sighed. He seen better looking corpses than the reflection that stared back at him. Splashing some water on his face he spoke.

"Fun's over. Go find someone else to infect."

He heard Ruby's voice in his head. "You're welcome for my help by the way. What if I don't want to leave?"

"Then I'll go out there and get Bobby to evict you. I want to get a shower and then get some sleep and you ain't get a free look or into to bed with me."

"Your brother's really more my type." Ruby laughed at the face he pulled.

"No details please. Get…now."

"Ok, I can take a hint. I'm going. Although where I'm going to find another coma victim…."

"I'm sure that you'll manage." He paused. "You really do care about my brother? I can feel it."

"Yes." Ruby's voice was soft inside him. "I need him to win this but that isn't all that this is about."

"He cares about you too." Dean nodded at himself in the mirror. "You hurt him, I'll kill you. Now beat it."

She laughed just once more and left, almost taking what little strength that he had left with her. He sighed and smiled at his reflection in the mirror. "Alone at last." Grateful that there was finally no one in his head bar him he turned on the shower, stripped and slid under the hot water.

---

It was the smell of coffee that woke him. Slowly he sat up, groaning as his body complained that it was still tired and didn't want to move from the warmth and the comfort of the bed just yet. Ignoring it he got up and dressed quickly, strolling out to meet the others.

Sam was at the table, nose in a book and coffee in his hand. Robert was working on a concoction in the kitchen and Bobby was cleaning weapons.

"Hey."

All three turned in his direction as he walked in and threw himself down on the chair next to his brother.

"Hey." Sam acknowledged him, running his hands through his hair, his nerves showing. "How you feeling?"

"Like I've been to Hell and back." He grinned to let his brother know that he was joking.

"Look it to." Bobby piped up.

"Still better looking than you, old grizzly chops."

Bobby smiled. "Yeah he's fine. Once the smart mouth's fixed you know that the rest isn't far behind."

Dean flipped him the finger as Robert walked out the kitchen and handed Dean a glass. "No coffee?" Dean eyed the glass' contents suspiciously. "I take it you expect me to drink this?"

"Yes."

Robert pushed Dean's hand with the glass in it closer to his face. He stuck his nose in it and inhaled. "Doesn't smell that bad. What's in it?"

"Just a few herbs and some honey to make it less bitter to taste. It'll help."

"Sure." Dean tilted the glass and downed it in one, immediately starting to choke as the liquid burned its way inside. "Shit."

Robert looked at him with innocence in his eyes. "Oh and there's a little whisky in it too."

"A little." Dean croaked the words. "Sure gives it a kick."

Bobby stood up and stretched and gathered some of the weapons up. "Robert I need to load these in the car, can you give me a hand?"

Robert nodded at the elder hunter. "Sure." He gathered up the rest and followed Bobby outside.

Sam shuffled nervously again in his seat. "Dean…I…about…"

Dean raised his hand to stall his brother's chick flick moment. "We're good, just next time….send the bitch down ok?" He looked round. "Speaking of which, where is she?"

"She's outside, something about guardian sigils for travelling." Sam shut the book and looked at his brother. "What now then?"

"I don't know." Dean looked over at him and then almost screamed as a hand touched his back. "Jesus you guys really need to learn to knock!" He turned on the angel and Sam smothered a laugh as Castiel stepped back at the look on Dean's face. "Stop sneaking up on me!"

Castiel half-smiled. "Use that face on the other angels….and you won't have any problems getting them to leave you and your brother alone."

Dean laughed. "Was that a joke from the angel there?"

Castiel shrugged. "I have a job for you, if you are up to it."

"Does it involve Alastair, Lillith or any side trips to Hell?" Dean tilted his head and raised an eyebrow.

"I know where the next seal will be broken."

"So that's two yes' and a probably then." Dean stood and grabbed his boots. "Where?"

"Head for Blackford and I'll met you there." Dean blinked as the angel disappeared as fast as he'd arrived.

"Wish I could do that, save a lot of time, tyre tread and gas." Sam look wistfully at where the angel had stood.

"One super power at a time…_please_." Dean finished fastening his boots and straightened putting his arm round his brother's shoulder. "Beside you'd miss travelling with me in the Impala."

Sam knew that the simple action meant that he was forgiven and it made him feel worse, knowing that Dean would forgive him for anything that he did to him, even if he would never forget it. He didn't know how his brother could do that and he wondered briefly if it was love or need but then he realised that it didn't matter which it was. Sam was Dean's brother, his family, and for his brother that was enough of a reason.

He wiped his face briefly. "Yeah, 'cos your choice of music and your singing are just a joy after a few miles."

Dean tightened his grip until it was almost a hug. "Always."

Sam leant into his brother's hug briefly and then pulled away. "Yeah."

They walked out to the car and Dean stopped at the sight in front of him. "I know you're not drawing on my damn car!" He started forward and caught what he knew must be Ruby's arm and surveyed her handiwork. "You really have a death wish were I'm concerned don'tcha?" He rubbed at the small sigils on the car and sighed as they didn't come off.

"Relax, a little touch up job after we've finished with them and she'll be as good as new."

"Touch up?!" Dean's face darkened. "You mean this won't just rub off?"

"That would kinda defeat the purpose." Ruby put her hands on her hips and smiled at Sam.

Even on the new face, sam knew that smile. "She's yanking your chain."

Dean looked between them. "Really?"

Ruby laughed. "Really. A little oil will take them off, don't fret…besides it is only a car."

Sam grabbed her hand at that remark and pulled her away from his brother. "Think you'd better get in before he leaves you behind…." Sam looked at Dean face as he surveyed his car. "….or runs you over."

She pulled away. "I need to stay here awhile. Bobby wants my help with a protection spell. I'll catch you up…super bowl jet pack remember?"

"You sure?" She was giving them time together to talk, Sam was sure of it, he hoped that he could get his brother to use it. He ran his hands down the latest incarnation of the demon, still a petite brunette. He smiled, he had a different type, after Jessica, and Ruby knew it. He gently kissed her lips and knew that beside him, Dean was rolling his eyes. He flipped Dean the finger without pulling away and knew he'd been right as Dean chuckled.

Bobby walked over shielding his eyes from the bright sunshine by adjusting his well worn cap. "So, you boys off to raise a little Hell?"

Dean shook his head. "No actually, we're off to stop someone else raising it for us!"

"God help the world then."

"Funny, true….but funny." Dean shook Robert's hand. "Thanks." Robert nodded. Dean looked to Bobby and almost gave into the urge to hug the elder man to him. "Later."

Bobby took his hand. "Be careful."

"We will."

"Yeah right!" Bobby tilted the cap back.

"Always with the last word _Mr _Singer."

"Right back at you, _Mr_ Winchester."

Dean turned to his brother and they stood for a moment talking before they got in the car.

Dean leant forward, started the engine and pushed the cassette tape home into the dash.

Sam groaned as 'Highway to Hell' blasted from the car speakers. "Really?"

"Really! Appropriate don't you think?" Dean laughed at Sam as he closed his eyes and planted his hands over his face. "Still glad you came and got me back?"

"No." Sam lifted his hands and caught the quick glance his brother cast him. "Sorry I sent you there in the first place."

Dean grinned evilly. "Not as sorry as you're gonna be." He cranked the volume and hit the gas, spinning the car in graceful, yet vomit inducing, circles in Bobby's tight yard.

Sam just laughed.

-----

Robert stood beside Bobby watching the two men. "Do you think that they can do it? Stop the apocalypse?"

Bobby shrugged. "We'll find out soon enough, one way or the other. If they can keep it together long enough, I'd put my money on them as a sure bet…but then again if they lose ain't nobody going to be around to collect."

Bobby motioned to the house. "Whisky?"

"Yeah. Thanks."

They watched as the long black car was skilfully manoeuvred round the lot by it owner and then as it pulled away, it's paintwork turning to black fire in the dying sunlight.

Two knights in their shining steel horse ready to take on another day.

Real brothers in arms.

**Chapter End Notes:**

Well that's all folks!

Hope that you liked this, and thank you as always for reading and to my little band of loyal reviewers *big hug* for keeping me going.

Until next time, take care and cheers! Mary xx


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